when I was in this meeting we were the
business visiting the other business and
the purpose of the meeting was to
convince them it’d be a good idea to
sell a lot more of our product this year
so you can imagine there was the status
quo of these types of meeting is a lot
of persuasion and sometimes pleading
depending on the previous year so this
was the first of its kind for me I never
really worked in a business-to-business
environment before so this is a great
training opportunity for me to learn how
to conduct these sort of meetings and
what kind of information gets exchanged
but the interesting thing is it wasn’t
soon after the meeting started where I
noticed man if you take out the insults
the sarcasm the mockery and the jabs
this 8 hour meeting probably could have
been done in about two hours and I
started to realize that too was kind of
the status quo when I visit a business
visited another business as well well
what else I noticed was our leader Gerry
sat on the other side of the room and
didn’t participate in a lot of this
sarcastic jeering dialogue for the most
part and it wasn’t like he sat on the
sidelines either he carried a confidence
about him and I think while people were
talking inside chatting there would be
an occasional glance over his way
wondering what is this guy going to say
what is this guy all about and then it
was Jerry’s turn to speak and as soon as
Gerry opened his mouth in the first
sentence the entire room went quiet and
all eyes turned towards Gerry it was by
his second sentence that in between each
word you could hear a pin drop in fact
I’m quite certain some people even held
their breath now normally when of when a
business visits another business they’re
not the ones in charge but since the
second Gerry opened his mouth we were
calling the shots and everyone in that
room would willfully follow and my
takeaway was man that’s what leadership
sounds like that’s what leadership looks
great leaders can be defined simply by
the rigor and the mindfulness they have
around around the thousands of signals
coming out of them every second every
day there’s so much transmission coming
out of our bodies in our body language
in our tone in the words that we choose
and just a simple mindfulness can
separate great leaders from average
leaders in fact let’s try this for a
second think about yesterday and think
about all of the signals that came out
of you everything every outward
communication whether it was a text an
email the messages that you send the
calls that you made the conversations
that you had think of them all for a
second and tally them all up there’s
probably going to be hundreds if you
actually grab them all because I’m even
talking body language here now ask a
simple question next to that did it have
the intended response did it have the
intended impact so you have your total
signals and you have your total yes
there’s only the esses because sometimes
there wasn’t even intention that’s
that’s part of the exercise here now if
you were to turn the esses into the
total signals what would the score look
like this is the same advice a financial
planner would give you when you say hey
I want to get rich cool start watching
what you spend every single day write
everything down including every cup of
coffee and watch your money grow it’s
this mindfulness of communication that
will help a leader understand how to
craft messages that cause others to
understand how they can make an impact
and isn’t that what Millennials have
been telling us over and over and over
again I want to work in a workplace
where I can make an impact the other
beauty of a cadence around what your
signals are doing where they’re going
and the plan for them is you begin to
reveal your own leadership development
that gap between what you thought was
going to happen and what actually
occurred is revealing the surgical
development plan for your leadership or
you could go down to a bookstore and get
a book on leadership but I’m warning you
I looked on amazon.com and when I search
for leadership and management 750,000
options came up in fact in 2050
alone four books per day were published
on leadership an average of four books
per day so I have fun with that
development plan or you can simply
remember this when what you say and what
you do causes someone else to act with
purpose and intention you’re leading the
magnitude behind the understanding and
belief behind those actions reflects the
strength of your leadership I call this
effect the leadership signal the
leadership signal is made of two
frequencies if you will and these two
frequencies are often where a leader
stands when they begin their leadership
career now if everything was going well
they would balance both frequencies in
their development but it’s not often
what happens in fact it rarely happens
I’ve only seen it a few times and I call
that the unicorn leader the first signal
frequencies think critically the ability
to think critically and deal with facts
and information in the what and the
knowledge behind strategy and
understanding the second being to
cultivate trust the people ears building
rapport building trust ultimately
understanding that trust is the
cornerstone of any great team is how
this signal develops so if we were to
put this into a way that we can index it
and understand how to plot where we are
and where we need to go it would look
like this now in the beginning of a
leaders career most leaders come
prepackaged if you will with a modest
amount of understanding how to cultivate
trust and how to think critically then
the next stage in their career gets
interesting because they become a bit of
a self laboratory and they emit the
signal is required to lead and some come
back with no effect and some come back
with a positive effect each one telling
them Kay that’s where I’m gonna develop
I’m going down this cultivate trust
clearly I’m a people leader let’s do
this or they grab hold of information
and just have this ability to send it
out to their teams and they understand
it like pretty good with facts I’m gonna
keep this up and roll this way well we
get begins to happen in their career is
a somewhat
unbalanced over-indexing and one or the
other so someone that is starting to get
strong in to think critically piece not
so much on the cultivate trust piece can
begin to sound very intellectual very
intelligent loves data loves analysis
the kind of person you want presenting
and building your Excel charts they
become the go-to they have the correct
answer often in fact it bothers them
when they don’t they draw their
motivation and their inspiration and
their confidence from the what and the
knowledge required in any strategy
conversely that lead from the front
cultivate trust signal let’s go this way
follow me begins to understand like hey
this is really working I’m getting in my
groove here I can connect with people I
can build rapport they respond to me
very well this is the type of leader
when they walk into the room people
smile they’re happy to see them they
connect very well they build development
plans very well but you can sense
something’s a little off I remember
going to this this Roadshow and one of
the most incredible inspirational
leaders finish their speech and I think
everyone afterwards was just like I just
feel good I want to go do stuff get
stuff done me too let’s go get stuff
done give it what stuff good good point
and a lot of the time because that think
critically pieces missing they make
people feel good but information is
missing as these typical development
plants continue we can go into a danger
zone and now you have a leader that is
becoming unhealthy for an organization
this extreme over-indexing and think
critically is turning this leader into
something someone people used to admire
into someone that people fear their
impatience and intolerance with people
grows and their awareness that they
don’t really have that natural ability
with people is creating a somewhat of an
insecurity inside as well and someone
that’s this intelligent and this
intellectual does not want anyone seeing
an insecurity so they develop a dictator
style of leadership they lose the
ability or don’t have it at all to
understand if I communicate this how
will people react what will their
response be I was in another meeting and
his PowerPoint slide goes up and this
guy was a senior leader in part of more
of the analysis side of our business and
what he was trying to demonstrate was
our financial costs in our labor spends
but the audience was young leaders young
salespeople and I remember seeing that
PowerPoint slide go up and it said human
capital expenditures and I think some
people in the room kind of went huh what
does that mean others in the room like
is that what you’re calling us seriously
and had they had a modicum more of
cultivate trust that slide may have read
conversely an extreme over-indexing of
cultivate trust can create similar
insecurities now this leader is growing
up into this company or there’s business
and is tasked with more responsibilities
and their absence of critical thinking
is becoming more and more evident what
was once a strength in building loyalty
with people and having people connected
to them and wanting to go wherever they
go
becomes a bit of a dark power because to
mask that lack of critical thinking they
become manipulative they use that
ability to understand people quickly to
manipulate so you can imagine the
repercussions of having these two types
of extreme over-indexing people are
leadership signals in a company and what
that would do generally generationally
into a company over time attrition would
increase and it already is people would
not understand how to deliver a message
that helps Millennials understand what’s
my impact here I want purpose and lastly
these are the examples for young leaders
on what leadership looks like this is
not the example that you want I think
you know where I’m going with this the
balance signal of think critically and
cultivate trusts is the ultimate
leadership signal permeating through and
getting into the hearts and minds of
followers and team members with
increased signal strength with
experience time knowledge and the
information required to increase it
imagine everything that I said every
message I delivered to you satisfied the
what and the why at the same time
imagine I could tell you what your
personal stake is because I know you so
well and gave you a very clear concise
message on where the business needs to
go every time this is ultimate
leadership signal quality and this is
the kind of signal that will permeate
the noise that exists in today’s world
this is also the kind of signal that
would seat you on the doorsteps of
executive leadership for that interview
the greatest executive leaders I’ve seen
carry both of these strengths that day
in that boardroom meeting I remember
when Gerry looked down the room from one
of the lines he said was we are going to
grow 46% this year and we’re gonna do it
with or without you we’d like it to be
jaws were dropped and everyone waited
what’s next he commanded that room
because as he spoke there was a comfort
before we get carried away though we got
a problem we got to deal with the rules
of leadership communication have changed
it’s not as simple as it used to be way
a long time ago when mankind first
needed leaders it was pretty simple
hey clan we’re gonna go hunt that deer
over there let’s do it because we need
to eat tonight I’m gonna inspire you by
leading the way and being fierce or
stronger braver and louder pretty easy
as mankind got more complex and military
and governments form the need for
critical thinking emerged as well and
the signal required that same emotional
intelligence and critical thinking
fast-forward to today and today is the
20-year spec compared to the rest of
time leadership has existed there’s
something new we got to deal with and I
call it static it’s a noise that exists
every day you wake up to more
distractions more changing of opinions
fact fiction fact that becomes fiction
in five minutes
fiction that becomes facts than ever
before we are bombarded our trust has
gone down with communication so the
signal has to be so strong it permeates
through that we had another problem our
attention span parents the room agree
with me wholeheartedly a study was done
and it was done in Canada so you can be
that showed that the average attention
span of someone today has gone from 13
to 14 seconds before the cellphone was
invented to an average of eight seconds
today it’s no wonder we have to say
everything in 140 characters or a
10-second video or a heavily filtered
photograph every time we speak but maybe
you didn’t know this either our
attention span is now one second lower
than the goldfish that poor creature we
kept making fun of for years for having
nature’s notoriously worst ability to
focus and remember things
I guess Nemo had the last laugh after
all
was golfing with Jerry one day guys an
incredible golfer but can t do and he
looked over and he said Trevor can I
give you some advice certainly listen
Golf is a very complex game there’s a
lot of things going on in every minute
of the game a lot of things you got to
think about and pay attention to
couldn’t agree more Jerry I think that’s
your problem though you’ve been playing
you just keep showing up to that tee
saying I’m going to get better at golf
today I’m gonna get better at a hundred
things at the same time what if I gave
you one thing you could focus on and by
the end of today you’re not gonna be a
great golfer which would be better than
you were yesterday and in one day you
could master it shut up and take my
money Jerry what do you got for me
and he said listen look look where your
belt buckles facing at the beginning of
the beginning of your swing now look
where it’s facing at the end of your
swing this is how it should look this is
how the end should look that’s it it’s
all I wanted you to focus on for the
rest of the day and he was right by the
end of the day I will never forget
looking at my belt buckle every time I
golf one day one skill earned point zero
zero five percent better at golf so how
do you tune your leadership signal into
that that zone of execution that that
area that gets messages across where
people get stuff done start small you’ve
got a big endeavor ahead of you and
everyone’s going to be different
think about taking an inventory of every
signal that’s coming out of you and
assessing it and asking yourself is this
making an impact is this making a
difference you could do that starting
today once you start paying attention to
it you’re gonna find your own belt
buckle lesson and that could happen
today so tomorrow you’re technically a
better leader once you start to think
right before you craft any of your
signals I have the best interests of my
business and my company in my mind and I
have the best interests of my people in
my heart
then you’re already well on your way
thank you [Applause]