Episode 105: Powerful Humility

The following podcast is presented by Ensign Services Inc, a company engaged in the business of providing contracted-for administrative and back-off-his-type support services to post-acute healthcare clients. Ensign Services provides accounting, human resources, compliance, legal, risk management, information technology, training, construction support, and other such miscellaneous services to its clients. These contracted-for services are available to be utilized at the sole discretion of its clients. References within the podcast to the company and its activities, as well as the use of the terms "we," "us," "its," "our," and similar terms used during the discussion are not meant to imply that Ensign Services Inc, or the Ensign Group Inc, has any direct operational control, supervision, or direction of the independently-operated post-acute healthcare entities. Okay, you guys, I'm excited. We are here for another podcast. I think I want to call this podcast "The Power of Humility." It's a little bit ironic, right? I think of "humility" sometimes as weakness, but that's obviously incorrect. And I am here with Spencer Burton, otherwise known as L. Presidente. I think that's your rapper name that you go with. And then Jesse Lilkin is his rapper name, Lilkin, also the rock wannabe. I know he's trying to pursue his ambitions of having his body look like the rock. So we're going to be talking about humility, and nobody has more qualified to talk about humility than these two. Don't you guys feel that way? You know, I was going to say that I'm the most humble person I know, right? I'm in cliché. But no, it's a hard one to talk about. To answer your question, like, the more I study this, and we've studied it quite a bit, Jesse and I, the more you realize this isn't something you're naturally good at. Yeah. I think I've come to the point, I know it's not a dichotomy, it's not you either are or aren't, I sort of feel like all of us struggle with lack of humility. It's just becoming aware of that. And I know you both spoke on this in the annual meeting and I'm assuming that we've talked about this in the past that we worry that that pride and hubris could be one of the cancers of this great organization. What's a cancer? A cancer is something that is killing a seemingly healthy body, sometimes unbeknownst to that body, and so I know a lot of you spent a lot of time preparing thoughts on the importance of humility. But before we get into the why, this is one of my pet peeves. I feel like we misdefine humility a lot. I feel like we tend to equate it with, you know, humility is, oh, you guys are all better than I am and I'm no good and we tend to see equate it with weakness, with self-loathing, and I don't think that's what it is. So maybe help us get on the same page as to what we're talking about here. Okay. So I mean, when I think about humility, one of the things I've come to realize, and I mentioned this in my speech, was that hubris tends to say, look at how great we are. Humility is an acknowledgement that the principles are great, not that we are great. I think that's where we miss that definition a lot. I agree with that, I think we struggle a little bit sometimes with a pride of authorship. Almost like there are principles, they're not our principles. Everything we teach here, these aren't, these aren't clays, principles. These aren't even enzymes, principles. They're just great principles that we get to decide whether or not we live them. No, I like that a lot. I was actually going to pretend that the C.S. Lewis quote was mine since you said this up properly attributed to C.S. Lewis, I love this quote because I think it helps me understand exactly what you said. C.S. Lewis said, humility isn't thinking less of yourself, in other words, having low self-esteem, it's thinking of yourself less. It really is, to me, humility is this powerful reorientation away from what's natural for us. Yes. Natural to be me, me, me, how's it going to affect my income, my status, my ego, and it's an orientation towards others that allows you to truly become impactful? And I think we do naturally care about credit. I overshare the quote by Harry S. Truman that says it's amazing what you can accomplish as long as you don't care who gets the credit. And I think we all listen to that, not our heads, but if somebody gets the credit for something that I've been working long and hard on, it does pinch me. It stinks. It does stink. But what it's pinching is my hubris. It's pinching my lack of humility. So hopefully we all listen to this podcast and this discussion, not thinking boy, so and so needs to hear this podcast. Hopefully we're all looking internally and saying, okay, this is something I struggle with, because all three of us have been saying it's a hard one to do because you can see your weaknesses. So, so with that better understanding of what humility is, maybe either share why pride or hubris is so dangerous, because I think there might be some listeners that are thinking, you know what, I think a good amount of hubris is healthy. I disagree with that and or why is, you know, why is humility so important? I'll start with kind of that last question, you ask the idea of humility being so important. So as I was studying good to great this time around, I thought I would be, you know, finding technical principles that could help me and there's amazing principles in there. But I read it this time, what I realized is the overarching themes, kind of the fuel in the engine of what makes companies good to great is leadership principles that he defines as level five leadership. Yeah. And that's not just humility, which sometimes maybe we think of as weakness, it's this powerful humility that's, it's a mix of being personally humble and being very, very committed to the cause driven for the cause, which are not at odds with each other. They mesh well with each other when you think about it. Yeah. In fact, in Colin's book, he, you know, he found that in every single one of these good to great companies during the period where they made the jump from good to great and really separated themselves from their competition, someone or some many people at the helm had these qualities of level five. They were very, very humble people, but they're also very, very driven for the mission of their organization. I think it plays so well to us in enzyme. I also studied a lot about just history. It got me thinking, okay, does this apply to history? You picture this, right, Jesse? Him just studying. He's got these little glasses on and he's digging in and his mustache. He had a head in his mouth for a week. My helm's tooth jacked up. No, exactly. No, I wish I had time in those days. I wish I did. No, but I was thinking about it. And in history, you'll think about the people that have truly been impactful. These are the people that had level five attributes, too. I went back and I looked at a lot of people who in their moment were the most powerful person in the world. For example, you know, there was someone that I studied that was prime minister during the 1920s. The time when Gandhi was in India. And this prime minister, MacDonald, was in charge of 25% of the world's population. Yet none of us know who he is. All of us knew who Gandhi was. Yeah. Who had no title, no authority. No authority. Yet he created a movement that's changed the world and will for a long time. Florence Nightingale. She was under the thumb of a military officer doctor who hated nurses. He made her life very difficult and he was the most powerful guy in, you know, the British military establishment for medicine. Yet Florence found a way because of her drive and her humility to impact. And now we have a profession that all calls her our matric. And I'm assuming none of those people set out to aggrandize their own name. That wasn't what it was about. It was about doing something great that maybe this is the wrong way to say it. The hubris for the cause, that is the wrong way to say it, but this drive for the cause instead of drive for the self. Just thinking about that, I think actually if they had cared about themselves, they would have given up. Think about it. If Florence were all about the glory, she didn't get the glory. She suffered. Yeah. But she cared about the people and the beds that were suffering. The perfect example of this is, you know, the early first century BC, Tobiria Caesar, Emperor of the Roman Empire, owned, ran everything in the modern world. Yeah. Most powerful person and reign for 35 years. There's still statues in pristine condition you can see of him, museums throughout Europe. Yet none of us remember Tiberius. There was a simple carpenter during that same time who, you know, walked around and taught principles to people, suffered a lot and helped people, Jesus. And now, you know, today two billion people call themselves Christians. It's the idea of temporary power, authority, fame, ego, money. Yeah. It's temporary. Lasting authority, lasting impact comes from powerful humility. The infinite game. The infinite game. Yeah. Really going for that just cause and being that humble person. But I mean, Spencer talked about looking at history and analyzing that through the lens of humility. And in my speech, I talked about Odysseus and the converse side of that, which is- This was before the movie. Jesse was way before his time. Way before. Way before. That's right. He's why they made the movie to Christopher Nolan. But anyways, I mean, I talked about Odysseus, which is Greek mythology, but we're talking about the other side. If you're not humble, you have hubris. This story is about a hero who's captured by a cyclopsy. name Polly Famous and how he uses his humility and his wit to escape. But unfortunately, the story doesn't end there. And yeah, and you've heard from my speech, but as Odysseus is sailing away from the island that him and his men were trapped on, he just couldn't resist yelling out to Polly Famous and just taunting him and boasting of his win. And that's really what led to the story. And describing his name to the win, right? Y'all saying this. Tell them. Tell them Odysseus, son of Rear Dish like did this to you, you know? And that really is what was the impetus to the story of the Odyssey that we know, because that leads Polly Famous then to pray to his father Poseidon to curse Odysseus, which ultimately lengthened his two-day journey home after a 10-year war in Troy. And that lasted 10 years on sea after that. And it's just, it's a clear example of hubris leading to the downfall of somebody whose life was heroic. Yeah. So then my fear in that is, because we know examples of, you know, we always talk about not becoming the next blockbuster, not becoming the next Blackberry companies that were kind of high on the horse and then through hubris or whatever you want to attribute it to, you know, they struggle. The lesson I can learn is, okay, so be humble and don't have pride. But how do we do that? How do we avoid that hubris when it's so natural to us to, you know, Odysseus was a humble person or was at least acting humble? That's where he gained his victory. And then his hubris just exploded out of him and that becomes his downfall. Is there something actively I can do to avoid hubris? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think it's kind of scary because the pattern is just weaved into the fabric of our lives and we see it happen to so many companies, like you've said. Yeah. But we're not invincible to it. And in order to not have that to happen to us, we just have to keep questioning ourselves. We have to keep inviting our challenges, be open to feedback and just continue to try and thrive to be the best in the world. Yeah. And really look for opinions that are contrary to our own. Because when we talk about Blackberry, Blackberry assumed that iPhone was not going to be a threat because it's a keyless phone. Blackberry at the time had my first one was a Blackberry when I was in E.D. Yeah, the first. Yeah. And it had a larger market share of people that were using the Blackberry product at the time. Yeah. But look at them now. Nobody uses a Blackberry. Everybody's on Apple or Samsung, you know? Yeah. So I get that it's hard, but we have to be willing to say that nobody's perfect because that's just the hardest part to actually live out. Yeah, meaning people will say, well, yeah, I'm not perfect. Nobody's perfect, but actually asking for specificity, right? When hey, Clay, let me tell you some things that you do struggle with. And those are hard to hear that, but you're saying seek those things out and ask. And even, you know, we know we believe we're doing better than anyone else out there in this industry. But to be able to say, but where are we failing? What do we need to be learning? Yep. And again, that's just one component. Like another component would be probably ethical fading. We have to be very concerned about ethical fading. And you just released a podcast on that. And I think thanks for the plug. Yeah, plug. Yeah. Yeah. We need to be continually willing to check ourselves that we aren't ethically fading. And lastly, I think we should continually be focused on succession planning and trying to be excellent at this. And this is I think where we go the most wrong. Yeah, yeah. Because we talk about succession planning. We know it's important. Yeah, we know and we talk about being extremely intentional, but are we? Everybody listening should ask, do I have a succession plan right now that if and when I leave, this organization will get better because they have succeeded me. Yes. And that kind of sucks to think about conceptually, right? Because we want someone to do worse. Yeah. I mean, you strive to be your best. And then the next guy you train up comes in and potentially does better. Like that concept is just it sucks a little bit. So you're saying like how do you feel? Jesse right now is the market leader in Southern California. Somebody replaces you and and and somebody else comes to you and says, man, the market has never been stronger since, you know, whoever Jesse's succession plan is, Jesse feels what happy humble, humble Jesse feels happy. Yeah, humble Jesse happy for the market. Yeah, real Jesse personal Jesse. Talked it to my wife saying, man, I did so much for the market, you know, and they don't appreciate me because it becomes about credit. It becomes about pride of authorship and all of these things that again, we have to recognize this as natural and we have to fight against these natural tendencies, right? Yes. And I don't know what we need to do to really get good at this, but in order for us to continually live the infinite game and be humble about our future and our organizational success, we just have to continually make succession planning one of the most important things we do. Yeah. And part of that is we again, I mentioned it before, but we need to continue to give each other feedback. And I mean, this is feedback to us right now where we're not good at succession planning. We got to be better at it as an organization, but we have to continually give feedback in operational areas, clinical areas, cultural areas, and we have to do it kindly and with love. But in order to do that, we need to all understand that humility needs to be at the root of all that. You know what's fascinating to me is it seems pretty obvious that the inability to receive tough feedback comes from a lack of humility, but the inability to give tough feedback also comes from a lack of humility. And that's something that's very much an epiphany to me because it's all about our feelings and the blame that they ascribed to us, that's all hubris. But if I only care about accomplishing something great and truly helping somebody else be better, that would only be lack of humility that would have me holding back. I mean, I think Christopher always said, right, that one of the most unkind things we do as partners is to have information that can help somebody else be better and withholding that information from them. So this is kind of something that some of us know as the pride cycle, right? It's the nothing breeds failure light success because we have success. Odysseus was humble, that led to success, that success led to pride, that pride led to failure, and that failure then tends to lead to humility, and you become a little bit cyclical. When you start thinking that you are great instead of the principles, then there's a problem. So we have to check ourselves. We can do it in our language all we want. Oh, no, I'm not great. Everything is great. But if we truly think that, then we have a problem. Acknowledge the principles are great and then decide whether or not you're going to live them. But all right, Jesse, let's go back to your point. And I know, I know Spencer made this point in his speech to about not sharing difficult feedback with others, comes from a lack of humility. Again, it comes from selfishness and we don't want people to blame us, all of those things. It comes from hubris that is only thinking of how uncomfortable it will be for us to share, right? So Spencer did this self assessment in his speech and he handed this out. And what we'll try and do Spencer is when we release this podcast, we'll in the email, we'll send the self-assessment for people to go through. And as they listen in on this, they can kind of follow along. But it's a reality check. This is a chance for us to really see, okay, when I did this self-assessment, I probably thought my humility was higher than it actually was. And this self-assessment, I guess it helped me. That's the right way to say it. So let me go through each of the categories. And just any comments that you want to make on it, let's go to that. People with hubris tend to be self-focused, whereas humble people are others focused. So this is the C category, the C meaning S E E category, how we see the world. Question number one, when someone calls in sick, am I worried or bugged? How am I with the names of people around me? Do I make a point to get to know each new hire at every orientation? And then am I developing future leaders, including a succession plan? So which of those do either of you want to comment on? I mean, I've already commented on succession planning, but I don't mean to drive at home once again, but I think we just need to continually focus on succession planning and make it intentional process where you're developing somebody to be better than you. You have, it's not a normal mindset for most, but from the humble mindset, it's the right mindset. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I would say, I appreciate that succession planning. I actually love all these questions because they take a concept that could be really theoretical and you start really asking these questions and it leads to action, which is what we all need before we want to stay safe. I'm going to go with, I mean, number one, when someone calls them sick, I think that's one that really convicts, most of us that have people that are working in our departments or in our organizations, but I want to focus on two and maybe a little bit on three. It's this idea of, do I know the names of those around me and do I get to know people at orientation? My team is laughing at this podcast right now because they know that this is such a challenge of mine. It's a challenge for a lot of us and, you know, we know the book, How to Win Friends and Influence People, the author says that the suite of sound that anyone ever hears is the sound of his or her own name. So I think we know this conceptually. So if we know something, it can help someone. We know it can mean something to that person and we don't do it. It's probably because we have a certain level of hubris, right? And people say, well, I'm not good with names. I've heard that from people at times. I'll stop saying that. But let me just, let me just push a little bit harder on that podcast. This podcast is done. I'm done with this. Let's push on that a little bit. That's like saying, okay, I'm not a good swimmer. Okay? That's true. There's some people who are naturally amazing at swimming. They're buoyant. They float. Their arms move better than others, okay? But anybody can become a good swimmer. And if you're in the middle of the ocean and your life depends on it, you'll do your very best to swim. I know someone in an organization, a nurse, I really look up to, a nurse leader. I look up to who had never done any swimming in her life, okay? In fact, when she started, if we're talking about the same person, actually started going backwards when she first started trying to swim. Right. But this person wanted to compete in triathlons. And so guess what? A third of the triathlons are swimming. So she decided she was going to learn to swim and it wasn't easy. But she didn't say, I'm not a good swimmer. She said, this matters to me. And I think we can do the same with people's names. I know of an ED who, when he took over a new facility, he went in there and he told everyone on day one. I'm going to know all your names by day 30. And I'm going to give $5 to anybody who can come to me and I don't know your name after 30 days. And then he had people come into his office. He'd give him candy bars. He'd talk to him. He'd associate their name with something. And he didn't have to give out many $5 bills on that. But it's because he put the effort and was he a good name person? It doesn't matter. He put the effort in just like that. It was the intention. It was the intention that made the difference. But another person I know goes into meetings and sits down. And when people do their introductions, people usually introduce and say their favorite candy bar or their favorite ice cream or embarrassing moment. We do this and everyone just laughs. I know people who actually go and draw a map of the room and write the name of each person. So they can intentionally go back and use that person's name during the meeting versus saying, I'm not good at names. So I guess what I would say is those are two really concrete ways, as uncomfortable as it is. He tries to say, do I see people as people or do I see myself and my comfort as being more important? I say, I'm just not good with names. So, hey you, how's it going? Well, that segment was really uncomfortable for me, but I'm comfortable for me too. It's uncomfortable for me too, though. Clay wants everybody to just deal with the facts that he doesn't know your name. When I smile and say, "Hey, champ," I'm not doing it. All right, let's move on because I'm now sweating in my armpits. All right. For the here category, you point out that people with hubris are closed-minded and tend to speak first. I'm really bad. I just really struggle with humility. Let's just everybody write that down. They tend to speak first, whereas those with humility are curious and really good at listening. Seek first, understand, then to be understood. For a long time said, that's my weakest of the seven habits. So here are the self-assessment questions. Do people tell you that you're a good listener? Do people feel grateful or bothered when someone shows your opinion is wrong? Do you seek to learn something from people around you every day? That's kind of the multiplier from the book multipliers. And do I seek first, understand, before trying to be understood? Which one stands out? For me, I like the first one. No. I know. I know. But no. Let's move on. How about there, please just tell one of us that one time. I would love to hear that from my wife. I think I mentioned my wife in the last podcast. She's like, don't talk about what you're talking about. And you didn't listen. And I didn't listen. But she is somebody whose feedback, I hold dearly, and I think I has given me the feedback that I need to be a better listener, because when we're arguing, or when she's giving me feedback, I'm already thinking about what I want to say back to her. And she said, did you even listen to what I said? And I said, yeah, I said this, and she's like, that's not what I said, you know? That is where tensions get hot is when people don't feel heard. When somebody truly feels heard, that tension drops. That's a good sign that you're missing out on it. Yeah, I love that one. It convicts me. And then number two, which you read, I'll read it again, says, do you feel grateful or bothered when someone shows your opinion is wrong? I feel bothered most of the time, if I'm being totally honest with that one. And I think we, as most people listening to this podcast, are a leader. And you may say, well, you know, I'm a nurse on the floor. You're leading people around you, or I'm a CNN, or you're leading people around you. Or maybe a peer leader or something like that. But as leaders, we are in a position where this is extra hard, because we can create echo chambers. You're in a position of power with the residents you're taking care of, right? It's hard for them to say stuff to you, believe it or not. If you're an administrator of a building or a DON, it's hard for your staff to say, no, I think you're wrong. And let me prove to you why. I feel like this is something that we have to be extra careful with. If we show genuine gratitude when someone proves us wrong, hard as that is, it will encourage more feedback. And that's the feedback that's going to allow us to get better. If we are even remotely defensive or shut people down or say, I don't want to hear that, it's so easy for those that maybe we're in a position of power over or authority over, so easy to shut them down. And you know what? One of the greatest things I think we can do to retain both our patients and residents help them be comfortable. And especially our staff and teams has helped them feel like their voice matters. And it takes powerful humility to do that. Jim Collins says that. He says the level five leader does three things, write people in the right seats, ask the right questions, but then the third one creates a safe space where people feel like they can debate. I'm going to practice the thank you for showing me how wrong I was. I'll try that phrase and see if my heart will eventually follow it. Next category you call seek. People with hubris hide weaknesses and easily get defensive or offended easily. Those with humility both share and receive brutal facts with gratitude. So questions, do I make it easy for people to challenge me? Do I get defensive when receiving tough feedback? Do I openly share my weaknesses with others? And do I come to meetings with sincere questions and not just answers? Those are all again super practical things that I think we could all do better at. For me the worst one is number two, do I get defensive when receiving tough feedback? But thankfully there's a little hope in question number three, which is do I openly share my weaknesses with others? So I want to share that that's my weakness. I think I feel like I do too poorly and three really well. I do feel like I get defensive when others give me my, but I do feel like I openly share my weaknesses. Think of the difference. I hope so because I have the same problem, but think of the difference for those around you if you say, look, I really want to not be defensive when you give me hard feedback. I'm still working on it. I'm a person just like you. And I need your help on that. By sharing your weakness with others, you're not doing it as an excuse. You're not saying, hey, I'm just not good at taking feedback. So I'm going to yell at you and just deal with it. You're saying I recognize this is not what I want to be. You're doing number three. Yeah. You're doing number three and that is powerful. I think generally folks are, people are good. People are not out there to just, you know, hang their leaders. They're there. They recognize leaders are people too, but if you express openness and humility by sharing your weaknesses, folks will give you the benefit of the doubt, especially if it's authentic. And if they see that you're trying. So that's what I hope for those around me that they'll see that as hard as it is for me to not get defensive, I'm trying. And I hope that you guys will help me get better. It's funny that we're afraid to do that because nobody wants to work for anybody that thinks that they're perfect and that thinks that they know all the answers. Yet traditional non-level five leadership says you've got to be invincible. Whereas level five leaders, it's that authentic humility that says I'm personally not perfect. But this cause is something special. And I care more about the cause. So I want you to tell me that I'm not perfect and help me get closer so we can together advance the cause. I also think it's a little bit of us wanting to be so successful as leaders and as an organization. So yeah, we say we aren't perfect, but we truly sometimes think inside, well, I am perfect. And I am doing everything I'm doing, which I think it's a balance between being able to recognize that yourself and truly, and like what Spencer was saying, Jen. and you only work at it and not just show people out, an outwardly appearance that you're comfortable. - John Aubrexon shared with me, I'm in a butcher it, it was a couple of years ago that he shared it, and I think it was an MIT or a Harvard study that said 70 or 80% of people suffer from impostor syndrome, and I think because we do suffer from impostor syndrome, we do what we can to build that facade so that people will follow us and when in the reality, we need to do the opposite. Okay, so let's move on to that. - Can I just say one more thing on that side? - Yes, I think those numbers are true, and I would say level five leaders, get over impostor syndrome, and because it's more important to be-- - Almost embrace it, yeah. - You just embrace it and help people help you. The last one on that is number four, and we had talked about this before the podcast started, but it is just such a practical-- - Which is, do I come to meetings with sincere questions and not just answers? - Yeah, and whether that's a one on one meeting you're having, whether that's a staff huddle, whether that's a cluster meeting, I've seen clusters transformed from mediocre to great, powerful movements that change results and change the outcomes for our residents by just people thinking, "What do I need help on?" And then coming with that and allowing people to come prepared, it changes the entire tone and culture when someone goes first by saying, "Here's something I don't have the answer to help me." And giving people a chance to prepare for that, it's powerful. - Okay, so let's move on to how we speak. People with hubris might try to maintain artificial harmony or replace genuine feedback with flattery, think about the difference between praise and flattery, right? Or justify a partner's weakness. Humble people, when they see something, they say something with love and kindness. Feedback is honest and fully committed to the growth of others around them. So assessment questions. Do I withhold feedback from partners out of fear that it will hurt them? Yes, I do. Have I recently shared feedback with someone that made them upset but better? Do I rationalize my silence because I don't know enough to be helpful? Do I frequently make deposits of sincere, positive feedback? - Number three, do I rationalize my silence because I don't know enough to be helpful? That one rings true to me right now, especially because Steve, just last week it happened where I was in a meeting, filling in for Adam and I was with a group of much more intelligent people than I am and they were discussing a topic that I was not fully confident in. - Right. - And I'm usually more talkative and Steve recognized that and then he texted me on the sign. He's like, oh gosh, you're talking so much. It's arcasically because I had it set a word and I texted back. I'm like, I feel like I don't have anything to say because I don't think I could be helpful enough. But I think that's somewhere I struggle. - Yeah. - I don't know necessarily what the right answer is to get better at that, but. - Well, we sometimes will say like, I think I need to give them this feedback but I might be wrong and it's a little subjective and so we decide we're just gonna stay quiet instead. You literally narrated the voice in my head. - That's it. - I am the voice in your head, Jesse. Don't you forget that. - I think that's totally normal and again, so being level five is not normal. That's why we're talking about it. We have to work really hard to get better. It's just like that. That nurse had to do it swimming. Hubert says natural humility is not. You have to fight for humility, right? - Especially the kind of humility that can move our organization through. - That's right. - There's a quote from Mollier and I won't do it in a French accent, although I haven't been practicing - Just thinking I'm Googling who Mollier is. - No idea. - It's a French philosophy. - He's so desuces, friend. - Well, he said, the more you love someone, the less you flatter them. It is by excusing nothing that true love shows itself. I think that's beautiful. It's poetic and it's true. That said, I think number four is the one I wanna comment on and that's the question that says, do I frequently make deposits of sincere positive feedback? - Not flattery, sincere positive feedback. - Sincere positive feedback. And just because you're positive doesn't mean you're flattering and just because you're negative doesn't mean you're thoughtful. - Right. - In order for, again, there's a spectrum. Imagine a line and on one far end of the line is brutal feedback, right? But how often do people truly receive brutal feedback? That's like when you're in a shouting match and the other person's not listening, they're thinking about what they're gonna shout back to you because defenses are up. On the other end, you've got this insincere life. - But Jesse's life goes through, it sounds like. - This insincere flatter, I'm gonna save you by keep talking. - Yeah. - This insincere flattery on the other end of the spectrum, right? So brutal feedback or insincere flattery, what we really need to do is be effective and that's being in harmony or in balance. I think giving enough deposits whether it's with your kids which I need to work on this or with your spouse or with your CNAs that you're working with or your department head team or your cluster partners. If we're never giving those deposits of sincere, credible feedback, it's a lot harder for people to hear our voice when we're trying to share things that can maybe be critical but truly helpful. And so again, I think it's all about effectiveness and frankly giving sincere deposits is not that hard. We just have to think to do it. - Yeah, I'm not a fan of sandwiching. You guys know what sandwiching is where you're giving somebody tough feedback and you sandwich it in between. - Too nice comment. - Too nice comment. You know, you really show up to work on time. You're so great at that. You're a terrible employee but I really appreciate your punctuality, right? But I am a huge fan of if I have 10 accountability discussions with somebody eight or nine of those should be really positive accountability discussions because then they feel that psychological safety so that when you do share those difficult things they can hear it because they know the specific positive things that you're already thinking. - If you know someone loves you and wants what's best for you, you'll listen to hard feedback. If you don't have that trust, I'm just restating what you said. If you don't have that trust you will miss out and our organization won't go where it needs to go. Frankly, we're not effective leaders if our people don't trust us because they don't think we care about them. - Yeah, that's true. Okay, next category is you put under share. Someone with hubris has the scarcity mentality, right? I win, you lose. Credit is super important to them. We talk about the window and the mirrors all the time. They are big into comparisons. They're super competitive. Whereas a humble person has the abundance mentality, win, win, right? Synergy, all of these things and loves to share credit outward. They're competitive but against potential not people. They elevate caring over competition. So here are the assessment questions on this. Am I bothered when someone else does something better than I do it? Be honest with yourselves. Am I driven by being my best versus beating someone else? There was a story of an Olympian. I think she was allegious and one of her competitors from another country was going through some psychological issues and she helped her a lot and she said, "Well, don't you want to. " She said, "Yeah, I do want to beat her." But I want to beat her best. I don't want to beat her because of some technicality. Do I routinely thank my partners and do I make a real effort to shine a light on others? - I want to touch on being driven to be the best versus being driven to beat somebody else. I think it's much easier to strive to beat somebody else. It's much easier to beat a record. It's much easier to beat somebody's top score. Rand and I have friendly competition all the time. - And beat them all the time, right? - I try to go. I try to go, Rand's too brilliant. But I think with that competition though, is it because I want to beat Rand or is it just because I want to be the best version of myself? Rand and I fortunately are very close. Rand, I said that out loud. - We're very close to the point where. - You should probably say that about your wife too. Just gonna keep going. But where we can have that competition but we collectively know that we rise with the tides and we both want to be the best versions of ourselves, not to beat each other, but because it's for the collective good. - Do you, we've talked about Mudita, we had a podcast on Mudita, do you have that feeling of joy when Rand succeeds? - Yes, that comes from humility. - Yes, of course. But that going back to what Spencer said before, it took time to develop our relationship first and have those positive deposits and trust first for me to get to that point and for him to also get to that point. - Yeah, the question that stands out to me thanks for that Jesse, I agree with that. And I would just say number three, which asks, do I routinely say thank you to my partners? It's powerful. And of course, I think we think we're always very grateful. Clay, you quote some statistic that says that there's a very different opinion of how often we're grateful than how often employees think we're grateful. - Yeah, 83% or no, excuse me. Yeah, 83% of leaders think they give an adequate amount of praise or show gratitude. 17% of employees think they receive an adequate amount of gratitude or praise. So there's a real disconnect between what we think we're giving and what is actually being received. - So what I would say is, even if you think you do well at this, there's probably room for improvement. And I think you are very good at this and you are likely somebody that feels like I need to be better. - I do feel like I need to be better and it's not just because I want to be selfless. It's because I've researched and there's amazing health benefits If it's to gratitude, like don't just do it for those around you do it for yourself. Not only are you more effective leader and get better results, but it's been proven from numerous scientific studies that when you share gratitude with people, it lowers stress hormones like cortisol, which are bad for your heart. It releases feel good neurotransmitters like dopamine, serotonin, and proves your mental well-being. It improves your cardiovascular health, helps you sleep better. On and on, it goes. Look it up if you want to at some point, but just by being grateful. So I would challenge everyone who's listening to this. Do something. If you think you're grateful, say thank you a few more times. Count how many times you say thank you to people at your facility today. Commit this week, or every week this month, you're going to write a thoughtful thank you card to someone and give it to them. I promise you, not only will you be more effective, you'll be happier and some of these health effects are proven, and I want you to be healthy. We need you to be healthy. Even just going through the verbiage or the action probably helps change your heart. I think it's a great, okay, I go to the last one, the grind. Last category is called the grind. Someone with hubris is a show horse that loves excuses to protect themselves from negative accountability. They are driven by standing out in comparison with others. Someone with humility is a workhorse that loves accountability as they're purely motivated by results, no matter who gets the credit, right? They're constantly working on themselves. So assessment questions, number one, when there is a bad outcome, do I naturally look for someone else to blame? Number two, how often do I turn to excuses to justify failures? Number three, do I use my title or position of leadership to avoid accountability? And we might have to say intentionally versus unintentionally on something like that. And then four, am I committed to truly becoming a better person and seek constructive feedback? Well, all of these, maybe because I wrote these questions, they all come together. So anyone wants to know my weaknesses, it's all 25 questions. But number three on here that says, do I use my title or position of leadership to avoid accountability? I wanted to explain that a little bit more because I don't think you would intentionally do that. I don't think any of us would intentionally do that. But I think we have to be more aware than we are because as a leader, you're already at a disadvantage. It's easy for you to, especially in our organization where there's so much authority at the local level, it's easy for you to, you know, by virtue of being the administrator, making the decisions, et cetera, to avoid accountability. It's easy for us, you know, with our cluster partners maybe to say, I'm the cluster leader like, and use that so people aren't giving us feedback when really all we're doing is hurting ourselves. I think we have to deliberately think of ways that we can make it easy for people to forget about our title and position and see us as a person that they care enough about to give hard feedback to and hold us accountable. Otherwise creating that safe space, that's psychological safety, and even inviting it because otherwise the default is they won't do it because we're at a disadvantage by our, virtual our leadership, our titles, our positions and that hurts us. Have either of you seen good examples of that in certain markets or certain companies? I know, I know for myself personally, I don't naturally ask for negative feedback, so I've put it, I do quarterly reviews with my people. The last question in my, I ask the same questions every time and the last question is, what else do I need to be doing to help you be more successful? I've found that if I put that in there, now it forces me to ask that question with other leaders and I'm trying to think of some off the top of my head, but with other leaders, they do that very naturally, hey, what have you seen that I could be doing better? How can I help you? When they have that in their repertoire of questions that they ask, I just see the safety and security that people have to offer those things because they say, hey, they're hungry for it. I recently saw an incredible example of this. I'm grateful you asked because I had forgotten this. I saw a leader who received his annual review and this is someone who had pretty, quote, "high up" in the company, received an annual review. It's a president in our company and he took word for word the 360 feedback and he published it to all of the people that he led and said, I wanted you guys to know the feedback that you gave me and I wanted you to see the things that I'm working on so you can help me be better. I thought, whoa, that's an example of not only saying, I want feedback, I'm doing something about it. But please help me. I thought that was super powerful. I'm not quite there yet, but I want to be there. All right. Anything you want to add to that, Jesse? You're good. Look, I appreciate you guys coming and talking about this. This is something. It's a topic, you know, a friend of my mom's once said, none of us are truly humble. He said, we'll be able to tell that we are humble as soon as we never get offended by anything. He says that a fence is an offense to our hubris and, you know, and again, it's hard to say we're either humble or not humble. It's not a dichotomy, right? It's a spectrum, but hopefully we've all come to realize through these questions and through this self-assessment where we struggle, what are the things we need to work on? What specifically can we do? I've always believed that the most powerful attribute of leadership is humility. And I knew I was lacking in it, this assessment showed me more, that I'm lacking in it even more than I thought, but I'm really grateful, you know, to each of you and to all six of our listeners who participated in this assessment. And hopefully the all six of them will pick something and say, all right, I'm really excited to attack this because, you know, like the title of this podcast says, I think there are a few things more powerful than humility when it comes to leadership. So thanks guys for coming. Yeah, I've just, and from my part saying, you know, like you said, we got to recognize this matters. It really is a principle that can move the dial in every single way. And we got to want it. We got to want to be more humble, more level five. If we want it, then let's, let's find something. There's probably many things, but find one thing to work on and the self-assessment helps with that. And use your partners, we have cluster partners, we have peers, we have an organization that really emphasizes, which requires humility to have an accountability partner. It totally does. And it's the only way we can be effective, right? So, so let's find a partner and ask that person to help us work on not just, hey, help me get my X, Y, Z, my census up or my PPDs in line or whatever, help me become a better person, help me become more humble. That's what I'm working on. And then just finally, don't get discouraged, none of us are naturally amazing at this. Level five leaders move their companies in the good to great study, you know, 10 times better than their peer companies because they were different, because they worked really, really hard to do things that don't come naturally. And as we do that, not only is our organization going to thrive and be even better, but we're going to have the health impacts and the relationship impacts of just being better people and feeling better in our lives and we're going to make a lasting impact, Jesse references the infinite game. We're going to have an impact on people's lives that will, you know, live long after we're done being leaders. All right, thank you. Really appreciate your guys' time.