Episode 61

full
Published on:

15th Oct 2024

Jodi Hume | The Art of Discernment: Building Confidence and Courage in Leadership

Welcome to another insightful episode of The Last 10%! Today, Dallas delves deep into leadership with expert guest Jodi Hume, a seasoned coach with a background in engineering and architecture. Together, they explore vital lessons from Jodi's entrepreneurial upbringing, the critical role of discernment, and strategies to empower emerging leaders within organizations. The conversation spans key topics like transparency in leadership, the distinction between revenue and real profit, the importance of emotional regulation, and combating isolation. Listeners will learn how to foster an ownership mindset among their teams, manage personal and organizational stress effectively, and embrace self-care for enduring leadership success. Tune in for a transformative discussion that will help unlock the final 10% of your leadership potential.

Connect with Jodi - https://atthecore.com/

Mentioned in this episode:

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Transcript
Dallas Burnett:

Hey everybody, we're talking to Jodi Hume today.

Dallas Burnett:

What an amazing woman.

Dallas Burnett:

She is a leadership coach and an expert on decision making and clarity.

Dallas Burnett:

She has some incredible stories about helping leaders navigate tough choices

Dallas Burnett:

and stay centered in the middle of chaos.

Dallas Burnett:

She's a great new friend of mine.

Dallas Burnett:

You don't want to miss.

Dallas Burnett:

This incredible conversation.

Dallas Burnett:

Welcome to the last 10 percent your host, Dallas Burnett into incredible

Dallas Burnett:

conversations that will inspire you to finish well finish strong.

Dallas Burnett:

Listen, as guests share their journeys and valuable advice on living in the last 10%.

Dallas Burnett:

are a leader, a coach, a business owner, or someone looking to level

Dallas Burnett:

up, you are in the right place.

Dallas Burnett:

Remember, you can give 90 percent effort and make it a long way, but it's

Dallas Burnett:

finding out how to unlock the last 10%.

Dallas Burnett:

makes all the difference in your life, your relationships, your work.

Dallas Burnett:

Now, Welcome, welcome, welcome.

Dallas Burnett:

I am Dallas Burnett, in my 1905 Coke Brothers barber chair the

Dallas Burnett:

new and improved Drive Studios.

Dallas Burnett:

But more importantly, we have a great guest today, Jodi Hume.

Dallas Burnett:

She has years of experience in coaching and helping leaders find clarity and build

Dallas Burnett:

confidence in the decision making process.

Dallas Burnett:

So we're just excited.

Dallas Burnett:

We got a whole lot of stuff to get through

Jodi Hume:

Thank you for having me.

Jodi Hume:

So I'm the first person in your new studio.

Dallas Burnett:

you're number one.

Dallas Burnett:

And we're excited to have you here.

Dallas Burnett:

We've been remodeling this for quite some time , makes it a

Dallas Burnett:

lot easier for us to produce

Dallas Burnett:

content now in the new studio,

Dallas Burnett:

so, um,

Jodi Hume:

I'd known I brought like champagne or something.

Jodi Hume:

Kick you off with

Dallas Burnett:

celebrate.

Dallas Burnett:

Yes, I know.

Dallas Burnett:

I should've had some bubbly to celebrate the new studios.

Dallas Burnett:

. So tell the listeners what your background is and now what you're

Dallas Burnett:

into.

Jodi Hume:

Yeah.

Jodi Hume:

I will jump in with where I used to jump in about how I got into this

Jodi Hume:

work, like through college or whatever, but on a podcast about a year ago, I

Jodi Hume:

made a connection that I had not made previously, which has a huge part.

Jodi Hume:

To do with what I do now, which is that I'm a third generation entrepreneur.

Jodi Hume:

So my mom was an entrepreneur.

Jodi Hume:

Not only was her dad an entrepreneur, but so is her mom, which is pretty remarkable,

Jodi Hume:

given that this was like the forties, the fifties, women, I, and someone has pointed

Jodi Hume:

out to me since then, I'm quite certain because of the way the laws work, the

Jodi Hume:

business was probably in my grandfather's name, but by all accounts, it was.

Jodi Hume:

Her business and it was separate from his business.

Jodi Hume:

And she passed away a couple of years ago.

Jodi Hume:

and, which is remarkable cause I'm 51.

Jodi Hume:

I had a grandparent until I was like 49.

Jodi Hume:

And, and to the day, the last time I saw her, one of the first questions

Jodi Hume:

she would ask me is how's business like that was like, not questions.

Jodi Hume:

Not how are the kids?

Jodi Hume:

Not like, how are you?

Jodi Hume:

How's business?

Dallas Burnett:

all

Jodi Hume:

She was all business.

Jodi Hume:

So it is actually something, I don't know why that didn't, probably because

Jodi Hume:

it was right there in front of me.

Jodi Hume:

sometimes something's so on the end of your nose, you just don't even notice it.

Jodi Hume:

But my childhood, like my Thanksgiving dinner tables, my, breakfasts, were

Jodi Hume:

all like, there were discussions about business and and not directly, but I

Jodi Hume:

would hear, conversations that were going on around me were about the

Jodi Hume:

decisions that were being made and, not just the decisions, but then the

Jodi Hume:

like fixing of decisions, because, once you made last week, that didn't turn

Jodi Hume:

out the way you thought they would.

Jodi Hume:

And so that fabric was woven all around me, my childhood that did not.

Jodi Hume:

Make me set a course for this work that like, as I said, that's something

Jodi Hume:

I just realized in retrospect.

Jodi Hume:

I actually, went to school for engineering and I'm switching to psychology.

Jodi Hume:

Like a lot of people, I didn't exactly what I wanted to do,

Jodi Hume:

but, both of those things though, they're not really that different.

Jodi Hume:

They're both about trying to figure out why something works the way it

Jodi Hume:

does and how to make it work better.

Jodi Hume:

thing in my brain.

Jodi Hume:

but I was going to go back to grad school for psychology and I was

Jodi Hume:

working at an architecture firm, thought I would stay there six

Jodi Hume:

months and ended up staying 16 years

Dallas Burnett:

Wow.

Jodi Hume:

as we, yeah.

Jodi Hume:

And it was, I loved the world of architecture.

Jodi Hume:

It has a lot of right brain and left brain, which is.

Jodi Hume:

Yeah.

Jodi Hume:

very satisfying to me.

Jodi Hume:

I get a little bit bored with either one

Jodi Hume:

on its own.

Jodi Hume:

or not always bored.

Jodi Hume:

I get unsatisfied without both.

Jodi Hume:

So that was super interesting.

Jodi Hume:

And I just happened to hit into that experience at just such an opportune time.

Jodi Hume:

We were about eight people when I started, they just wanted to be

Jodi Hume:

architects and just, I'm a designer.

Jodi Hume:

I do architecture.

Jodi Hume:

And what I learned about myself is I am really good at making things better.

Jodi Hume:

I also learned about myself.

Jodi Hume:

I'm not your girl to keep it going once it's made better.

Jodi Hume:

but that was perfect.

Jodi Hume:

And that's okay.

Jodi Hume:

And that's actually one of my leadership, like fundamental, Principles of leadership

Jodi Hume:

is like you don't have to get better at.

Jodi Hume:

There's some things you can grow.

Jodi Hume:

There's a, there's like personal growth and leadership growth as a

Jodi Hume:

leader that absolutely exists, but it is very distinct from trying to

Jodi Hume:

make the things that you are not wired for become part of your fabric.

Jodi Hume:

And that I will never be that girl who was like, check the

Jodi Hume:

box every Monday or the exact

Dallas Burnett:

yes, yes.

Jodi Hume:

because I'm really good at these other things.

Jodi Hume:

And so make a very long story short, I ended up being the COO and I just

Jodi Hume:

took care of everything that wasn't

Jodi Hume:

architecture

Jodi Hume:

as we grew from eight to close to 50 people by the time that I left.

Jodi Hume:

So we started off a little under a million dollars in revenue.

Jodi Hume:

We were about 10 or 12 when I left.

Jodi Hume:

and throughout that entire time, I sat in on the well, sat in on and then

Jodi Hume:

facilitated the Monday leadership team meetings, which every single Monday we

Jodi Hume:

met for sometimes up to three hours.

Jodi Hume:

It was like anywhere between three hours.

Jodi Hume:

And that is where all of the decisions were made.

Jodi Hume:

And so again,

Jodi Hume:

my every single week I participated in and cordon facilitated the conversations

Jodi Hume:

where we decided all the things that helped us grow from eight To 50

Jodi Hume:

people and I couldn't have, designed a better MBA program for myself

Dallas Burnett:

absolutely.

Jodi Hume:

yeah, cause we hit on all the topics and then all the

Jodi Hume:

topics keep coming back as you grow.

Jodi Hume:

You know, you can have a conversation about X when you're eight people

Jodi Hume:

and then have a conversation about X again when you're 15 and then 20

Jodi Hume:

and it's a different conversation

Dallas Burnett:

It really is.

Dallas Burnett:

And, we can get into that because one of the, I think one of the most difficult

Dallas Burnett:

things for business leaders or business owners is navigating and changing as

Dallas Burnett:

the world and your business changes.

Dallas Burnett:

Because if you're successful, I think a lot, I was actually having

Dallas Burnett:

this conversation not too long ago with a business owner and he

Dallas Burnett:

said, we're doing the same things now with a team of a hundred that

Dallas Burnett:

we were doing with a team of 10.

Dallas Burnett:

And it worked really well with a team of 10 and it works really

Dallas Burnett:

bad with a team of a hundred.

Dallas Burnett:

It's yes,

Dallas Burnett:

that's exactly how

Dallas Burnett:

that works.

Jodi Hume:

Yes.

Jodi Hume:

Bigger is not always

Dallas Burnett:

no,

Jodi Hume:

really isn't.

Jodi Hume:

The word that I feel like, since I have left that firm and now I just advise

Jodi Hume:

owners for a living, I do one on one work.

Jodi Hume:

And then I also facilitate leadership team conversations.

Jodi Hume:

So that's the breadth of my practice.

Jodi Hume:

Now,

Jodi Hume:

the word that I use Constantly is discernment, like the discernment of

Jodi Hume:

what is working, what is not working.

Jodi Hume:

You absolutely have to go gather information and advice and guidance and

Jodi Hume:

wisdom from people, you know, and books you've read and things you see on the

Jodi Hume:

internet, what you can look out there.

Jodi Hume:

But then the art is in discerning which of these things apply to me, which

Jodi Hume:

of these things apply to my business.

Jodi Hume:

Because for most of us doing, unless you have like a franchise creating and growing

Jodi Hume:

a business is a path that no one else has done that exact same path before.

Jodi Hume:

So you're not looking for a map.

Jodi Hume:

You need like orienting skills to find your way.

Dallas Burnett:

If you're an entrepreneur and you start a business and you grow

Dallas Burnett:

the business and you're successful and you make it to the other side of the

Dallas Burnett:

chasm where you're, generating positive income and you've met, you've made it

Dallas Burnett:

and you have this blood, sweat and tears journey, At the other side, you feel

Dallas Burnett:

like you've birthed, I literally had somebody said, we've been doing this

Dallas Burnett:

for 30 years and this I've got one, I've got my oldest child, I've got my

Dallas Burnett:

second child and then this is my other, my third child, you know, and I think

Dallas Burnett:

problem is that it's okay if that is what it is, like it's what you're saying.

Dallas Burnett:

You adjust to that.

Dallas Burnett:

you have to make and be discerning over it.

Dallas Burnett:

Just like your other kids.

Dallas Burnett:

I think when founders sometimes get into trouble is when they

Dallas Burnett:

don't realize that they actually.

Dallas Burnett:

Are treating it that way.

Dallas Burnett:

Right.

Dallas Burnett:

so it's like

Dallas Burnett:

a lack of awareness.

Dallas Burnett:

And so they make some weird decisions.

Dallas Burnett:

I would love to ask you a question, as you've experienced growing your,

Dallas Burnett:

originally growing the architect business going from eight to 50 people,

Dallas Burnett:

was there anything as you worked with leaders at the various stages

Dallas Burnett:

in their career, did you feel like there were some habits that you saw

Dallas Burnett:

successful leaders in your organization?

Dallas Burnett:

pull in that helped them sustain personal growth or, achieve that

Jodi Hume:

Their own personal cause I hear two things about

Jodi Hume:

their own personal or that of the

Dallas Burnett:

both, both, I will say both.

Dallas Burnett:

And, whichever one you want

Dallas Burnett:

to take on that one.

Dallas Burnett:

Cause they're both interesting

Jodi Hume:

Yeah, I'm going to start with the people in general, because

Jodi Hume:

that's what I, that's where I thought your question was going at first,

Jodi Hume:

the first things that pop to mind, but then I'll pop to the other side.

Jodi Hume:

And these two things are not mutually exclusive, actually,

Jodi Hume:

they're, they overlap together.

Jodi Hume:

so when I see teams that are really great teams or teams that

Jodi Hume:

are growing in that direction.

Jodi Hume:

and certainly that is one thing, I think one of the keys to our success

Jodi Hume:

at the architecture firm was we were very good at the growing people side of

Dallas Burnett:

really?

Dallas Burnett:

Okay.

Jodi Hume:

And a couple of the things that I think most contributed to

Jodi Hume:

that, and these two are very related.

Jodi Hume:

One has to do with the right amount of transparency.

Jodi Hume:

you don't, What this doesn't mean again, I come back to that word discernment.

Jodi Hume:

Like I often feel like everything I want to say, I feel like there's

Jodi Hume:

also like a little caveat to that.

Jodi Hume:

It's and I don't mean this, but this it's transparency does not mean

Jodi Hume:

that everybody in the company sees every single thing all the time.

Jodi Hume:

there are things that need to stay private or confidential.

Jodi Hume:

that's a given.

Jodi Hume:

so don't get, I don't want anyone getting hung up on that perspective.

Jodi Hume:

However, you.

Jodi Hume:

Often when I have heard leaders frustrated that either their people aren't thinking

Jodi Hume:

like owners or that people are making what they are venting are dumb decisions

Jodi Hume:

or short sighted decisions or whatever, I asked the question, and it is always

Jodi Hume:

a curious question because sometimes the answer is yes, they do know that it's do

Jodi Hume:

they have any line of sight to that thing?

Jodi Hume:

Do they have they seen how that works out?

Jodi Hume:

to take a very quickly.

Jodi Hume:

Tactical example, because the others would be too specific from

Jodi Hume:

a, from a particular company.

Dallas Burnett:

right.

Jodi Hume:

If someone works in a service company as a, like a

Jodi Hume:

pretty entry level person, they know what they make as a wage rate.

Jodi Hume:

And if they see a proposal where they see what you were charging for them

Jodi Hume:

on that proposal, they are often up in arms because they're like, what?

Jodi Hume:

You're charging three times as much as I make.

Jodi Hume:

That's not fair.

Jodi Hume:

And as an owner or as a leader, like people get frustrated by that.

Jodi Hume:

But my question is, Have you shown them how business works?

Jodi Hume:

have you laid out that this is a wage rate and then here are all this overhead costs

Jodi Hume:

and then profit allows us to do this.

Jodi Hume:

And this is like

Jodi Hume:

how the numbers work, because if you haven't done that, you can't be frustrated

Jodi Hume:

that they don't see what you see and, and that's a very tactical, sort of

Jodi Hume:

demonstration of how that shows up, but this is also true in the bigger picture.

Jodi Hume:

Like you have this vision and.

Jodi Hume:

And this is the personal growth side of it.

Jodi Hume:

You have this vision for what you want to create and how

Jodi Hume:

all these things tie together.

Jodi Hume:

And your mind is usually moving.

Jodi Hume:

Most entrepreneurs minds are moving in this like very fast movie.

Jodi Hume:

And part of the personal growth is to slow it down and figure out which frames of

Jodi Hume:

that movie does someone need to see, like still snapshots of or little snippets.

Jodi Hume:

What's the 32nd soundbite they need.

Jodi Hume:

So that they can see what in some capacity, otherwise they don't

Jodi Hume:

have the information to be able to act in the way you want them to.

Jodi Hume:

So that is a balance of, Of making sure people are seeing, learning, hearing

Jodi Hume:

about exposed to the things and the part that has to do with personal,

Jodi Hume:

but people growth too, is finding ways to do that way before those people

Jodi Hume:

are responsible for those things.

Jodi Hume:

And so

Jodi Hume:

at the architecture firm, they, they would, they had yearly

Jodi Hume:

retreats and they would bring, we were the emerging leader set.

Jodi Hume:

We had been there since we were eight, we were the kind of, we were the

Jodi Hume:

first ones to be named associates and.

Jodi Hume:

They would bring us out to the retreats and after they had their couple days of

Jodi Hume:

these are the principles, talking things through and they would always have like

Jodi Hume:

a little project for us to do, And not only did it make us feel important, but

Jodi Hume:

it was, they were in with great intention.

Jodi Hume:

They were training us to think like leaders.

Jodi Hume:

So one year it was, if we have this much for bonuses, how would

Jodi Hume:

you guys spread it out amongst the staff, including yourselves?

Dallas Burnett:

Oh, wow.

Dallas Burnett:

Ah,

Dallas Burnett:

very good.

Dallas Burnett:

Very

Jodi Hume:

So, you know, so of course we grapple with, there's that tiny

Jodi Hume:

part of us who like, we've worked so hard and we had no years, no bonuses.

Jodi Hume:

And now there's finally money for bonuses.

Jodi Hume:

So we're owed like, there's that tiny part of you on snap, but then you're like, but.

Jodi Hume:

These people on our team have also worked really hard in this last year, and that's

Jodi Hume:

why we have money for bonuses, and it's like all that happens very quickly.

Jodi Hume:

and it was also really, here's the thing.

Jodi Hume:

It's also, it wasn't just for our benefit.

Jodi Hume:

It was so good for the principals because they were sometimes

Jodi Hume:

surprised at who we picked.

Jodi Hume:

To give a bigger bonus to or something, because they didn't realize that

Jodi Hume:

person was super valuable or whatever, or they'd be surprised that someone

Jodi Hume:

they thought was super valuable.

Jodi Hume:

Wasn't on our list for like a high, but so it was also a conversation starter.

Jodi Hume:

another year we had a process of, who is.

Jodi Hume:

if we had to, if things were tough, who were the five or 10 people that

Jodi Hume:

we would fight to the death to keep?

Jodi Hume:

And who would we consider going that?

Jodi Hume:

That sounds a little mercenary, not mercenary, but

Dallas Burnett:

No, that's real life.

Dallas Burnett:

Yeah.

Jodi Hume:

Not great.

Jodi Hume:

But it wasn't about, deciding who are the bottom five.

Jodi Hume:

It was just a useful conversation to be like, are those bottom five

Jodi Hume:

or 10 really like, is that fat?

Jodi Hume:

Or is that muscle?

Jodi Hume:

Because we had to pick five or 10.

Jodi Hume:

Again, that's a useful conversation.

Jodi Hume:

It's not about picking out who's the bottom

Dallas Burnett:

Right.

Dallas Burnett:

Right.

Jodi Hume:

weird favoritism, but it's just processing and thinking like that.

Jodi Hume:

So those are some of the things of finding ways for people to be practicing

Jodi Hume:

with bigger leadership conversations before they actually have to be making

Dallas Burnett:

I love that example on a lot of different levels.

Dallas Burnett:

I think that when leaders hear the word transparency, they have this knee jerk,

Dallas Burnett:

negative reaction a lot of times but to your point, I think, what I love

Dallas Burnett:

about that is, is what can you share?

Dallas Burnett:

Because whatever you can share, then you can make, you can train against

Dallas Burnett:

and you can help them learn against.

Dallas Burnett:

And so that they get, like you said, that snapshot of they see and feel.

Dallas Burnett:

Cause all owners are like, yeah, I want people to be, make

Dallas Burnett:

this, have an ownership mindset.

Dallas Burnett:

It's yeah.

Dallas Burnett:

But what are you seeing and doing and what's your movie

Dallas Burnett:

that you're playing, that you're watching, that they have no idea.

Dallas Burnett:

And if they don't, then how, I, there was one company I was with, they were

Dallas Burnett:

really upset that, that they're, these, managers were not being, performing

Dallas Burnett:

at a certain level and I was like, Well, did they, how do they know?

Dallas Burnett:

Like they don't even know what their office is.

Dallas Burnett:

How do you

Dallas Burnett:

hold them and say, you need to make, you're not doing well when they

Dallas Burnett:

don't even have any idea of how well they're doing and how to make it more.

Dallas Burnett:

And so there's some things like

Dallas Burnett:

that.

Dallas Burnett:

So I think it.

Jodi Hume:

shared that with

Dallas Burnett:

Yeah.

Dallas Burnett:

And I they're open for it.

Jodi Hume:

other symptom of how I know that there needs to be more shared

Jodi Hume:

vision is when people are hesitant to make their own decisions, because

Jodi Hume:

leaders will often say Oh, I want you to make autonomous decisions.

Jodi Hume:

Like you just decide.

Jodi Hume:

But if you have not communicated what you want and therefore what will get praise

Jodi Hume:

and what will get like what's going to move you closer to the thing, it's like

Jodi Hume:

you have punched into two ways or GPS the destination and but you then you're

Jodi Hume:

holding the phone and you're saying, just decide whether to go left or right.

Jodi Hume:

You're like, you never, we don't, we have to look.

Jodi Hume:

So the symptom shows up is where people like look to you to decide

Jodi Hume:

whether to go left or right.

Jodi Hume:

And sometimes that's a confidence thing or something that can

Jodi Hume:

be like with certain people.

Jodi Hume:

But if everyone's doing it, it's because you're holding the GPS in

Jodi Hume:

your hand and they can't see it.

Jodi Hume:

And so they have to move to you because they don't know.

Jodi Hume:

They don't have an internal GPS because you haven't shared it with them.

Jodi Hume:

And so that's the other

Dallas Burnett:

I love that is the best analogy.

Dallas Burnett:

I love that analogy.

Dallas Burnett:

And it's so true.

Dallas Burnett:

And there's a certain amount of value.

Dallas Burnett:

And I think that a lot of leaders.

Dallas Burnett:

personal value and being the problem solver.

Dallas Burnett:

And a lot of times you get put into a leadership position because you are

Dallas Burnett:

the chief problem solver and people come to you for solving problems.

Dallas Burnett:

But it's like you're saying, if the company, if you are the vision, the

Dallas Burnett:

values and the mission of the company, and you're holding that phone and

Dallas Burnett:

you're not giving that direction to everybody else and disseminating that

Dallas Burnett:

information, which I think, values alignment, mission alignment, vision

Dallas Burnett:

alignment is where a lot of times people say, Oh yeah, we got values.

Dallas Burnett:

no.

Dallas Burnett:

I'm not talking about the things you put on the wall that nobody looks at

Dallas Burnett:

that you, you haven't cleaned lately.

Dallas Burnett:

I'm talking about how people make decisions in your organization,

Dallas Burnett:

but what it is it really goes even transparency at that level to that

Dallas Burnett:

example really is hindering and creating a bottleneck because if you're holding

Dallas Burnett:

the phone, you're not disseminating it.

Dallas Burnett:

Not only are you not being transparent, but you're literally

Dallas Burnett:

creating a bottleneck with yourself.

Dallas Burnett:

And having a lot of issues with delegation and people not knowing what to do.

Dallas Burnett:

And then, all,

Dallas Burnett:

these things.

Dallas Burnett:

So

Dallas Burnett:

yeah.

Jodi Hume:

feel like they make a decision and they get their fingers

Jodi Hume:

slapped, even in a lightweight, like it doesn't mean they get yelled at.

Jodi Hume:

It just means that you're like, Oh no, that, that's not what we wanted.

Jodi Hume:

And you're like, how was I supposed to know what you want?

Jodi Hume:

that doesn't

Jodi Hume:

feel good.

Jodi Hume:

Your central nervous system doesn't know the difference between my value feels

Jodi Hume:

threatened and a bear walked into the room because people want to do a good job.

Jodi Hume:

And You can so easily kick someone into that not full out fight or flight, but

Jodi Hume:

you from a neuroscience standpoint, it sucks all the glucose out of the nuanced

Jodi Hume:

critical thinking part of your brain and it puts it back into this like protective

Jodi Hume:

space, which is not your smartest thing.

Jodi Hume:

And that's where that can be really tricky.

Jodi Hume:

But I do want to back up to one thing.

Jodi Hume:

Part of being an owner is putting some intentional conscious thought into

Jodi Hume:

what you want out of the business.

Jodi Hume:

Because there's actually nothing wrong with wanting a business

Jodi Hume:

that scratches your itch of being Grand Poobah problem solver.

Jodi Hume:

or being what, or having a, what people will derogatorily

Jodi Hume:

call a lifestyle business.

Jodi Hume:

There's nothing wrong with that, but where people get into trouble is

Jodi Hume:

riding two horses at the same time.

Jodi Hume:

if what you want is to grow and scale, then you have to be able to.

Jodi Hume:

Share your vision in a way.

Jodi Hume:

And here's the key part that people get it because I often when I have

Jodi Hume:

this conversation we're having with someone, they're like, but I've told

Jodi Hume:

them, I told them we want to build the biggest whatever in the world.

Jodi Hume:

I'm like, okay, I believe you.

Jodi Hume:

I'm not going to argue with you about that.

Jodi Hume:

But however you have said it.

Jodi Hume:

It either wasn't enough times or not in enough different ways.

Jodi Hume:

Like maybe you needed like whatever it is, there's some gap in between what the way

Jodi Hume:

you have said it or how often you've said it, and them getting it in a way that they

Jodi Hume:

have internalized it so they can use it.

Jodi Hume:

And but if you want to be the problem solver, that's okay.

Jodi Hume:

But that is, that's a different kind of business and you just need

Jodi Hume:

to be okay with that and then stop.

Jodi Hume:

You're like, you're not going to like,

Dallas Burnett:

just, I know you see this, and this is, it's fascinating.

Dallas Burnett:

When you start looking at, organizations and businesses and their lifecycle

Dallas Burnett:

and the growth, you start seeing these plateaus, a $1 million business, that

Dallas Burnett:

lifestyle business, a $5 million business, and then it gets chaotic, and it's if

Dallas Burnett:

you're not gonna make it to 10 or 20, and what the leader doesn't understand is.

Dallas Burnett:

They're pushing on the wall.

Dallas Burnett:

Like I gotta, I've got to make it to the next level.

Dallas Burnett:

And it's say, but they're not trying to give, they don't want to

Dallas Burnett:

give up the things they had at the last level at the last plateau.

Dallas Burnett:

And it's yeah, that's not how this works.

Dallas Burnett:

Right.

Dallas Burnett:

So you see, it's amazing that you see the, the business.

Dallas Burnett:

The business growth, how directly it's related to the leader's ability to

Dallas Burnett:

grow and change with the organization.

Dallas Burnett:

And so if you've got to work like it right, like it, whatever that

Dallas Burnett:

lifestyle business is, and that's like where you get your happy space and

Dallas Burnett:

yeah, I love being the problems over the guy that we're going to come to.

Dallas Burnett:

Great.

Dallas Burnett:

It's it's just like you said, just be great with that.

Dallas Burnett:

but if it, but if you're wanting to move through that, whatever it looks like now

Dallas Burnett:

is not what it's going to be looked like.

Dallas Burnett:

And it was, it's not going to be what it looks like at one X,

Dallas Burnett:

two X, five X, whatever.

Jodi Hume:

absolutely two things pop into my mind with that one is

Jodi Hume:

I call those stages, like those plateaus, like business puberty.

Jodi Hume:

There are places where all of a sudden I will have, you know, founders or

Jodi Hume:

entrepreneurs thinking that like their business is a mess or that

Jodi Hume:

they're dying or that something is like completely run amok.

Jodi Hume:

And I'm like, no, this is just what happens.

Jodi Hume:

there's absolutely something, especially in service based businesses.

Jodi Hume:

It's a little bit different in like SAS companies or whatever.

Jodi Hume:

Or retail where something around like 18 to 24 people is one of these very,

Jodi Hume:

there's definitely something around eight to 12 people, like eight, it's not always

Jodi Hume:

right up cusping the like 10, 20, 30, but like those two are very distinctive

Jodi Hume:

in just things that start to like things that worked that just don't work anymore.

Jodi Hume:

and you either have to, decide to, I think of it.

Jodi Hume:

Metaphor.

Jodi Hume:

I always think of it as this might not, I'm like, 54.

Jodi Hume:

So I don't know if this is true for taller people, but if I'm walking out

Jodi Hume:

into the ocean right at the place where the waves crashed the hardest, where

Jodi Hume:

they're just breaking right there, it hits me like right at, like right

Jodi Hume:

in a place that I will topple over.

Jodi Hume:

Like I cannot stop.

Jodi Hume:

stand right where it hits.

Jodi Hume:

It's that center of gravity place where I'm like, I can't stand there.

Jodi Hume:

So I either have to back up where it's hitting me more like my knees or thighs

Jodi Hume:

or something, and so that's fine.

Jodi Hume:

Cause I can stand there and get hit with the little crashing waves or I have to

Jodi Hume:

push through to the big jumpy waves.

Jodi Hume:

Either one of those options is fine, but I cannot stand right there and get.

Jodi Hume:

Eat your shreds.

Jodi Hume:

that doesn't work.

Jodi Hume:

but to your almost one of the first points you made early on about the

Jodi Hume:

hundred people, 10 people, I, I run a round table for, run a couple different

Jodi Hume:

kinds of round tables for CEOs.

Jodi Hume:

And we had a company was a construction based company that, had been 8 million.

Jodi Hume:

I forget how many people they had, but they pushed up through to 12 million,

Jodi Hume:

had a lot more people, a lot more trucks, a lot more like logistics, just.

Jodi Hume:

So much more stuff.

Jodi Hume:

And we were doing a, he was sitting there talking about how they're just not.

Jodi Hume:

As happy, he's we're not even actually making more money because,

Jodi Hume:

growth and profitability are two very different things often.

Jodi Hume:

And that is often mistaken.

Jodi Hume:

he's so we've grown, but we're not making any more money, way more

Jodi Hume:

hassle, way more stress, way more worry about keeping all of this going.

Jodi Hume:

And it's just, and the things that we have to do, the people we have to

Jodi Hume:

be, the skillset that we have to use on a daily basis at 12 is not as fun

Jodi Hume:

as the skillset that we got to use.

Jodi Hume:

At eight.

Jodi Hume:

And so they actually had a, we, the group encouraged him to have a conversation

Jodi Hume:

with his partners around that.

Jodi Hume:

do they all feel that way?

Jodi Hume:

Turns out they did.

Jodi Hume:

And so they just made a very intentional, like they couldn't find any good

Jodi Hume:

reason unless they wanted to push up through to whatever, 16, 18, 20.

Jodi Hume:

because of their age, because of their energy, because of a million things that

Jodi Hume:

are very personal decisions., I don't think they went all the way back down

Jodi Hume:

to eight, but they did decide okay, there's this whole part, whatever it

Jodi Hume:

was, a division or a part of a division.

Jodi Hume:

I don't remember the exact pieces, but they're like, let's just not do that.

Jodi Hume:

And that means we will lose some revenue.

Jodi Hume:

But then we jettison that entire complicated.

Dallas Burnett:

Right.

Jodi Hume:

Department or vertical or whatever it was that got rid of a whole

Jodi Hume:

thing that was just a big hassle and required a bunch more people and a bunch

Jodi Hume:

more logistics and there's so much happier and they're actually making more money.

Jodi Hume:

That's the other thing too.

Jodi Hume:

It's do not conflate greater revenue with more joy, more

Jodi Hume:

profit, more money in your pocket.

Jodi Hume:

Like sometimes it is, but not always.

Dallas Burnett:

I love that.

Dallas Burnett:

I think that's, I think that's wise as well as discerning as it goes

Dallas Burnett:

back to your original statement.

Dallas Burnett:

I think that's a, I think that's a really great point.

Dallas Burnett:

And I think that's really hard for leaders because, a lot of times you're an achiever

Dallas Burnett:

and you want to win and you feel like, The next thing is you've got to, grow

Dallas Burnett:

in monetization or some type of level.

Dallas Burnett:

And a lot of times that's, you're playing the wrong game.

Dallas Burnett:

And I think that to your point, you can, win yourself into a heart

Dallas Burnett:

attack or high blood pressure or, stressed out anxiety, whatever.

Dallas Burnett:

And that's not winning.

Dallas Burnett:

so yeah, that's well, well done for them.

Dallas Burnett:

I'm glad they were able to, to see that and make the right decision for them.

Dallas Burnett:

I want to talk about that because making decisions is so important.

Dallas Burnett:

We've got a lot of.

Dallas Burnett:

Coaches and we say coaches.

Dallas Burnett:

So we have a one on one coaching system that we provide organizations

Dallas Burnett:

so they can drive coaching further down the organization and their

Dallas Burnett:

managers, we say are leader coaches.

Dallas Burnett:

And so they're coaching their teams every month.

Dallas Burnett:

And so they, they are also listeners of the last 10%.

Dallas Burnett:

And so I love talking about things that are relative for

Dallas Burnett:

that, Those listeners as well.

Dallas Burnett:

And decision making is a huge thing because when we engage with people,

Dallas Burnett:

especially as coaches, we're engaging on that level, whether it's talking

Dallas Burnett:

to an owner, business leader, or somebody that works directly

Dallas Burnett:

for us, we're always engaging in decision making and problem solving.

Dallas Burnett:

So I'd love to unpack some, you help leaders find that

Dallas Burnett:

clarity in decision making.

Dallas Burnett:

What do you think are key components in your opinion to make strong, confident

Dallas Burnett:

decisions, especially like under pressure?

Jodi Hume:

I almost think of it as Like facilitation and then coaching

Jodi Hume:

and then like mentorship and advising.

Jodi Hume:

they almost sort of make a continuum and one of the most important things

Jodi Hume:

is to discern what is needed in this moment because there are absolutely

Jodi Hume:

places where someone needs some sort of guidance or mentorship or direction.

Jodi Hume:

They need to see something that they can't see if it's like watching

Jodi Hume:

someone else parallel park a car like they need that sort of thing.

Jodi Hume:

But I re when it comes to decision making, I lean far more.

Jodi Hume:

even not even into coach land, like far more into facilitation, which is

Jodi Hume:

one more step removed from imagining that you have any answer that they

Jodi Hume:

don't like facilitation to me is like pulling out some Harry Potter movie I

Jodi Hume:

saw where they like use this one and like the stuff like came out of your

Jodi Hume:

ear pulling out these, the things that they don't even necessarily hear or see.

Jodi Hume:

and helping and listening for where they are confident.

Jodi Hume:

Like I, I break it into these, I break a lot of decisions into three things.

Jodi Hume:

And then there's a fourth thing.

Jodi Hume:

It bugs me that my categories for these ended up all starting with C

Jodi Hume:

because I do have this, this like irritation with the, with either

Jodi Hume:

things that go into an acronym or all start with C or the four Cs, whatever.

Jodi Hume:

but it just so happens that's what they are.

Jodi Hume:

So.

Jodi Hume:

Clarity is the thing that everyone is looking for.

Jodi Hume:

And if we can grab it somehow, that's fantastic.

Jodi Hume:

In my world, clarity means like there is information there and it's just

Jodi Hume:

like you're looking for an answer.

Jodi Hume:

There's and the answer is there to be found.

Jodi Hume:

And it's somewhat, I wouldn't go all the way into certainty.

Jodi Hume:

people are often, they say clarity.

Jodi Hume:

What they really want is certainty, which doesn't exist.

Jodi Hume:

And if what you are reaching for is certainty, maybe you shouldn't

Jodi Hume:

be an entrepreneur because very rarely is it about the right answer.

Jodi Hume:

very rarely it's more about, is it just like making sure it's not the wildly

Jodi Hume:

wrong answer because you can't know.

Jodi Hume:

So like sometimes there's clarity of Oh, I just didn't realize a thing.

Jodi Hume:

Or I just, we look for that first.

Jodi Hume:

That's great, but it is the rarest of the things that you could

Jodi Hume:

just be like, Oh, here's the

Dallas Burnett:

Right, exactly.

Jodi Hume:

the next thing I'm listening for is whether or not they have

Jodi Hume:

an internal confidence around it.

Jodi Hume:

And maybe they just can't hear it.

Jodi Hume:

Like someone will be telling me about their two decisions, the two options

Jodi Hume:

that they have for something, although rarely is it only two, but, and there'll

Jodi Hume:

be one part of it where their energy is and then we'd like blah, blah, blah.

Jodi Hume:

And then there's and I could do this and dah.

Jodi Hume:

And then they'll be like, or we could just, blah, blah, blah.

Jodi Hume:

Start this thing and do that all of a sudden it's like

Dallas Burnett:

Yeah.

Dallas Burnett:

Yeah,

Jodi Hume:

they know somewhere in there.

Jodi Hume:

And so the other thing I'm list in that situation, I'm listening for whether

Jodi Hume:

down deep, they know somewhere in there, there's a confidence that it is the wrong

Jodi Hume:

decision and they just need to have that.

Jodi Hume:

mirrored back to them so they can hear it.

Jodi Hume:

Sometimes it's the confidence that it's the right decision, but it's just scary.

Jodi Hume:

then they need to hear that and acknowledge that's what they have

Jodi Hume:

to draw from to take that next step.

Jodi Hume:

Cause they know somewhere in there, they know.

Jodi Hume:

And so that's the confidence like connecting to their own

Jodi Hume:

grounded confidence piece.

Jodi Hume:

The third category, I just name as courage because That's when

Jodi Hume:

there's not a lot of certainty.

Jodi Hume:

There's not a lot of clarity.

Jodi Hume:

You can't really know, and you don't know either.

Jodi Hume:

And so you have to find what is any step I can take.

Jodi Hume:

Knowing that I will course correct on the other side of that decision based on what

Jodi Hume:

new information I get by taking the step.

Jodi Hume:

that just is almost like a blindfolded leap into the oblivion.

Jodi Hume:

And you just want to find the safest step you can take.

Jodi Hume:

And like, All action of

Dallas Burnett:

yeah, mmm,

Jodi Hume:

there is one more thing that I listened for that does not fall into those

Jodi Hume:

sort of C's and that is sometimes they are indecisive because they're exhausted

Jodi Hume:

and either temporarily exhausted or longer term exhausted and their decision making

Jodi Hume:

capacity is degraded and that is Something that I don't think a lot of people realize

Jodi Hume:

about executive functioning, which is all the things that you want as a leader.

Jodi Hume:

it's prioritizing and strategy and problem solving like that all

Jodi Hume:

happens in this prefrontal cortex.

Jodi Hume:

But underneath of that, or like a precursor, whatever metaphor you want to

Jodi Hume:

use is emotional and energetic regulation.

Jodi Hume:

If you are emotionally hijacked, If you are tired, if you were run down, if you

Jodi Hume:

were just, there's a bunch of different kinds of rest, like they have nothing

Jodi Hume:

to do with lying down and sleeping.

Jodi Hume:

They're just like creative, recharging, social, recharging,

Jodi Hume:

like all that kind of stuff.

Jodi Hume:

If you are not at capacity or if you're at low capacity, I should say, you don't

Jodi Hume:

always have to be at full capacity.

Jodi Hume:

But if you are chunked down in your capacity, it's going

Jodi Hume:

to show up in your decisions.

Jodi Hume:

And I have literally said to people like, Go take a nap and let's talk tomorrow.

Jodi Hume:

Get a good night's sleep or go walk in the forest.

Jodi Hume:

Like different people.

Jodi Hume:

I have one client who I can tell the minute we get on a call, if

Jodi Hume:

he has stopped doing his daily,

Jodi Hume:

like really hard workouts.

Jodi Hume:

Because he is someone who needs every day to do really intensive

Jodi Hume:

workouts or he starts to fray around the edges and he's just like all

Jodi Hume:

the things don't work as well.

Jodi Hume:

So that's the other thing that I'm listening for.

Jodi Hume:

That's the hardest thing I think for people to see themselves because they

Jodi Hume:

don't know they're getting run down.

Jodi Hume:

it where it helps to have someone else listening.

Dallas Burnett:

I love all of this, by the way.

Dallas Burnett:

this is great.

Dallas Burnett:

and I think that, there's so many things that pops out.

Dallas Burnett:

the idea of, when you said that about exhausted and depletion,

Dallas Burnett:

I kind of the word decision

Dallas Burnett:

fatigue.

Dallas Burnett:

Yeah.

Jodi Hume:

Yes.

Dallas Burnett:

I definitely think that, you can get into a place of exhaustion

Dallas Burnett:

where decisions are actually fatiguing.

Dallas Burnett:

And it goes back to all three of the things that you mentioned.

Dallas Burnett:

It affects clarity.

Dallas Burnett:

If we're exhausted, we're in a fog and it's hard to it's hard

Dallas Burnett:

to even see what's really clear.

Dallas Burnett:

It's very easy to have a negative, visor on.

Dallas Burnett:

Cause it's like, I can't deal with this.

Dallas Burnett:

And you may be saying it cause you don't have the energy.

Dallas Burnett:

It may be because you're just exhausted.

Dallas Burnett:

and then again, with the courage and taking the next step, I love

Dallas Burnett:

how you talked about really focusing and paying attention on yourself.

Dallas Burnett:

If you're leading others, then you really should, if you don't have

Dallas Burnett:

awareness of your state, you're handicapping your ability to

Dallas Burnett:

lead effectively, in my opinion,

Jodi Hume:

Yeah.

Jodi Hume:

And I wish I, I feel like my life's work right now is finding strong

Jodi Hume:

enough words for that because

Jodi Hume:

it's so easily gets sort of thrown into this bucket of some sort of like

Jodi Hume:

mushy, soft self care kind of a thing.

Jodi Hume:

And I'm like, no, this is science.

Jodi Hume:

This is strategy.

Jodi Hume:

This is.

Jodi Hume:

I spent a, I've not, I did not live an athlete life like I was a theater kid,

Jodi Hume:

but I, for about 10 or 15 years, I did some pretty intensive weight training

Jodi Hume:

and I actually did like a strong woman.

Jodi Hume:

I did two strong woman competitions

Dallas Burnett:

Yes.

Jodi Hume:

will not be news, but the week before a competition,

Jodi Hume:

you do not work out hard.

Jodi Hume:

You actually do very little.

Jodi Hume:

Which I was shocked by.

Jodi Hume:

I was like, wait, we have five more days that I could be like upping my PR.

Jodi Hume:

No, that is not how you perform at your highest, violinists, like the most premier

Jodi Hume:

violinists take a lot of naps, like people who actually perform at really

Jodi Hume:

high elite levels know these things.

Jodi Hume:

And yet the rest of us somehow think that we're like, Oh, but no,

Jodi Hume:

I'm just going to power through until I'm absolutely obliterated.

Jodi Hume:

I don't.

Jodi Hume:

And also this conversation ends up often looking like we're talking

Jodi Hume:

about just like the long term or like we're just talking about sleep.

Jodi Hume:

I have a very concrete example of how this works in the brain.

Jodi Hume:

So that prefrontal cortex is not just in charge of like decision making and

Jodi Hume:

prioritizing and those kinds of things.

Jodi Hume:

It is also in charge of impulse control.

Jodi Hume:

And so if just in a given day, You are.

Jodi Hume:

Our brains are not wired for marathons.

Jodi Hume:

Our brains are wired to sprint.

Jodi Hume:

And so the I'm sure most people have heard the recommendations like you're

Jodi Hume:

not really supposed to plow through for hours without taking a break that if

Jodi Hume:

you do 20 60 at most 90 minutes and then pause even for five or 10 minutes and

Jodi Hume:

walk around your house or walk around the do something different and then come

Jodi Hume:

back again like that kind of pausing.

Jodi Hume:

Ideally taking a little nap in the middle of the day, like that's not

Jodi Hume:

possible for everybody, but these kinds of things that put like punctuation

Jodi Hume:

marks in your day, sustain that glucose.

Jodi Hume:

Later into the day.

Jodi Hume:

So you don't run out.

Jodi Hume:

And here is what every human on the planet I think has examples of

Jodi Hume:

what happens when your glucose runs out for that part of your brain.

Jodi Hume:

So I don't know about you, but the number of times that I wake up of

Jodi Hume:

a day and I'm like, today's the day that I'm going to drink all the water.

Jodi Hume:

and eat the salad and I'm going to do this thing and I'm going

Jodi Hume:

to do that thing and whatever.

Jodi Hume:

And then what feels like some sort of like magic witching hour come

Jodi Hume:

four or five or three, four or five, six, seven, eight o'clock, whatever.

Jodi Hume:

By the time evening comes, you're eating a sleeve of girl scout cookies and

Jodi Hume:

wear yourself a bourbon or whatever.

Jodi Hume:

It happens to most people that suddenly in that second part of

Jodi Hume:

the day, all of a sudden just everything gets turned upside down.

Jodi Hume:

That is not magic.

Jodi Hume:

It is not a mystery.

Jodi Hume:

It is what happens when this prefrontal cortex, which is the

Jodi Hume:

like hungry hippo of your brain, like it uses up glucose really fast.

Jodi Hume:

And if you don't replenish it with pauses and breaks and like all these

Jodi Hume:

things that we know through sleep.

Jodi Hume:

science help your, that part of your brain sustain that glucose.

Jodi Hume:

then, cause it's going to happen anyway.

Jodi Hume:

You're always going to struggle in the evenings cause

Jodi Hume:

that's like towards the end.

Jodi Hume:

But if you plow through in the morning, it's going to start hitting at two

Jodi Hume:

instead of five.

Jodi Hume:

And that is just what happens because when this part doesn't

Jodi Hume:

have that, it can't think.

Jodi Hume:

In as much nuance, it can't prioritize and strategize.

Jodi Hume:

It cannot control the impulses to snarf the Girl Scout cookies.

Jodi Hume:

And so it, There's such a lived reality to this.

Jodi Hume:

And yet we still are holding a grip of refusing to believe that the

Jodi Hume:

Earth's not flat kind of a thing.

Jodi Hume:

it's like the science is there, and we're just for some reason,

Jodi Hume:

not willing to like, believe it.

Jodi Hume:

We believe in a culture and we believe that leadership has

Jodi Hume:

to be like, lonely and hard.

Jodi Hume:

And it's actually, the science is there.

Jodi Hume:

Yes.

Dallas Burnett:

And I think that as leaders, whether you're a business

Dallas Burnett:

owner or just leading a team, the reason it's so important, and I

Dallas Burnett:

like the fact that you're trying to find really strong language for it.

Dallas Burnett:

Let us know when you do.

Dallas Burnett:

we'll have another conversation.

Dallas Burnett:

I think you've, I think you've got a good start to it.

Dallas Burnett:

But, I think that the reason is that your, You're in the position of leadership.

Dallas Burnett:

And so you have a huge ripple on those around you, especially the

Dallas Burnett:

ones and the people that in the team members that you're leading.

Dallas Burnett:

And so when you come in and your impulse is not in control,

Dallas Burnett:

well, then you not only have.

Dallas Burnett:

The ability to eat a sleeve of Girl Scout cookies.

Dallas Burnett:

You also have the ability to lose control on one of your team members when they

Dallas Burnett:

don't turn in something on time or they don't do it in the way you want it.

Dallas Burnett:

And I think that ripple is not what you're wanting to create when you're

Dallas Burnett:

wanting to create a high performance team.

Dallas Burnett:

So I think that's another reason why it's so important.

Dallas Burnett:

To be aware of your state, what works for you, what routines you need.

Dallas Burnett:

Like you said, one, one of the people you work with needs to go intensive workout.

Dallas Burnett:

I have a morning routine that if I know I'm off, if I don't get through

Dallas Burnett:

the whole thing and I'm just like walking through, the morning, just

Dallas Burnett:

like in a fog and so know yourself, know what you need to do to get to that

Dallas Burnett:

place of high performance and then be disciplined about it and be consistent.

Dallas Burnett:

I think as it relates to your three C's, if you're coaching, If you're

Dallas Burnett:

coaching someone, and I agree that you have to wear different hats and

Dallas Burnett:

the facilitation is pulling that, that information out of a hundred percent.

Dallas Burnett:

I think that's true.

Dallas Burnett:

And we do a lot in our system is more about asking questions and providing

Dallas Burnett:

that, that moment, that space for people to reflect and hopefully pull some of

Dallas Burnett:

those ideas out, because there's a lot of times the leader, one of the things,

Dallas Burnett:

when we get busy, the first thing that goes is Taking time with our team

Dallas Burnett:

members to say, Hey, how you doing today?

Dallas Burnett:

Hey, what's important right now?

Dallas Burnett:

do you have anything that I can do to help you, take out some obstacles

Dallas Burnett:

that, you know, what's the next development goal you want to set?

Dallas Burnett:

How can I partner with you on that?

Dallas Burnett:

And I think that helping people gain clarity helps them make decisions.

Dallas Burnett:

and as a leader and as a coach, you're.

Dallas Burnett:

Any time that you can spend on alignment, getting in alignment with their work,

Dallas Burnett:

getting in alignment with your leadership, in alignment with the company's mission,

Dallas Burnett:

vision, values is less time you're gonna have to spend cleaning up the mess later.

Dallas Burnett:

I think with confidence, people that you're coaching, that you see

Dallas Burnett:

something in them that they don't see in themselves, and you can help them

Dallas Burnett:

move and make decisions if you inspire confidence in them and then encourage

Dallas Burnett:

them to have courage to step out and do something they haven't done.

Jodi Hume:

Yeah.

Jodi Hume:

And what you model as a leader is so much louder than anything

Jodi Hume:

you say in, with your words.

Jodi Hume:

and emotional contagion is one of the most unfortunate toxicities

Jodi Hume:

that a leader can create.

Jodi Hume:

and I have such compassion for it because they're not, they're not bad people.

Jodi Hume:

They're not, they are at the limits of what they learned about how to control

Jodi Hume:

and regulate their own emotions.

Jodi Hume:

Virtually nothing is as, talk about one step forward, eight steps back.

Jodi Hume:

if you want, To do the opposite of what we were talking about in the

Jodi Hume:

beginning of creating transparency, where people will make autonomous

Jodi Hume:

decisions and things like that.

Jodi Hume:

If you explode, emotionally on people when you're frustrated and cannot

Jodi Hume:

control your own emotional reactions.

Jodi Hume:

There is little else you can do that will bring out their best stuff because

Jodi Hume:

as humans, we are basically lab rats.

Jodi Hume:

And if we push a lever and get cheese, we will keep pushing the lever.

Jodi Hume:

If we push a lever and get shocked, we will stop pushing that lever.

Jodi Hume:

Real

Jodi Hume:

fast and it makes it, the word safe has been has a lot of baggage with it these

Jodi Hume:

days, but like it or not, we have to use it in this context because human

Jodi Hume:

brains literally evolved to keep us safe.

Jodi Hume:

that is what they do.

Jodi Hume:

So when your brain's Mer, if you've ever walked up to raging water or

Jodi Hume:

like a high thing, like a really high, your body will react like your

Jodi Hume:

brain's not Oh, I'm going to step back.

Jodi Hume:

I just did.

Jodi Hume:

I've just did a big travel.

Jodi Hume:

I was in the Azores,

Dallas Burnett:

Oh, wow.

Jodi Hume:

canyoning thing where at the very end we jumped off this,

Jodi Hume:

like they said it was six meters.

Jodi Hume:

It's 18, 18, 20 feet kind of

Dallas Burnett:

Oh, wow.

Jodi Hume:

was like, I'm just going to do it.

Jodi Hume:

I'm just going to do it.

Jodi Hume:

I'm not like, and I knew that if I stood there for a long

Jodi Hume:

time, that I would not do it.

Jodi Hume:

So in my brain, I was like, I'm just going to walk up there.

Jodi Hume:

I'm going to take the breath, like he said, and jump.

Jodi Hume:

But do you know what?

Jodi Hume:

That's what I was going to do.

Jodi Hume:

And my body actually had a different, I did end up jumping, but at first I had an

Jodi Hume:

involuntary reaction where my body's Nope,

Dallas Burnett:

Oh, wow.

Jodi Hume:

a wall hit me.

Jodi Hume:

It was wild.

Jodi Hume:

Your brain is programmed at the deepest, most intractable levels to keep you safe.

Jodi Hume:

And we cannot ignore that.

Jodi Hume:

I am not saying that you have to make, your workspace, like a kindergarten floor

Jodi Hume:

time where we're singing like Kumbaya.

Jodi Hume:

That's

Jodi Hume:

not it.

Jodi Hume:

But we all know that if you've ever had a friend who like, freaks out about

Jodi Hume:

something like this is a very human experience and we shouldn't even have to

Jodi Hume:

be convincing about why this is a problem, especially because at work getting in

Jodi Hume:

trouble or not being good enough or not doing the right thing can actually affect

Jodi Hume:

you at a survival level of your income.

Jodi Hume:

So people have a heightened need to get the thumbs up.

Jodi Hume:

Um, so that is one of the biggest personal growth.

Jodi Hume:

if you are a leader who struggles with Your own emotional reactions and usually

Jodi Hume:

they know it they, cause I've heard them say, I know I didn't handle that.

Jodi Hume:

I know I, I overreacted or whatever.

Jodi Hume:

So 2 things.

Jodi Hume:

1.

Jodi Hume:

repair, like being able to go to people and say, I did not handle that.

Jodi Hume:

that was unfair.

Jodi Hume:

That wasn't your fault or or maybe it was your fault, but I was frustrated and

Jodi Hume:

I had an outsized reaction, whatever.

Jodi Hume:

You can't keep doing that.

Jodi Hume:

Cause that's like the abusive

Dallas Burnett:

Yeah.

Jodi Hume:

Like, yes, I can't give you here since hours.

Jodi Hume:

Yeah, that can't be the solution, but it can be part of the solution

Jodi Hume:

while you are also working on it.

Jodi Hume:

and it's one of those things, it's going to help you in every aspect

Jodi Hume:

of your life, but most of it, most people weren't taught or modeled.

Jodi Hume:

How to handle bigger emotions and leadership running a company, especially

Jodi Hume:

going to bring out your bigger image.

Jodi Hume:

It is.

Jodi Hume:

It is some of the hardest

Jodi Hume:

personal development work that there is.

Jodi Hume:

And so you need better skills to keep that stuff in check.

Dallas Burnett:

It's very true.

Jodi Hume:

Actually, I just want to say this really quick.

Jodi Hume:

This is really important.

Jodi Hume:

That is actually part of why I created this, the work that I do,

Jodi Hume:

which, which isn't really coaching.

Jodi Hume:

It isn't really.

Jodi Hume:

So it's, I've jokingly call it like on call decision support.

Jodi Hume:

It's almost a little bit like business therapy.

Jodi Hume:

It's just for this place where all the things, whether it's a

Jodi Hume:

question or a problem or a rant or, or, just I have one client who.

Jodi Hume:

Who we also have meetings where we're talking about strategy

Jodi Hume:

and whiteboarding stuff out.

Jodi Hume:

But there's a fair number of times where she says, she's I call you when I need to

Jodi Hume:

burn off some of the emotion of a thing so that I can get recentered and then go back

Jodi Hume:

to my team and be a good leader about it.

Jodi Hume:

And I'm not coming in just like

Dallas Burnett:

Yeah.

Jodi Hume:

also like sometimes they need to sulk about something.

Jodi Hume:

I don't know where we got it twisted.

Jodi Hume:

That business doesn't elicit huge emotional reactions in us.

Jodi Hume:

also though, pair that with what we were talking about in the beginning,

Jodi Hume:

like, Oh, we want people really invested and treating it like owners of them

Jodi Hume:

completely emotionally detached.

Jodi Hume:

What is that?

Jodi Hume:

That

Dallas Burnett:

are you as the owner emotionally detached

Dallas Burnett:

when you come in the red Yeah,

Jodi Hume:

like why I wanted to, I call it on call decision support

Jodi Hume:

because I want people just like calling whenever they have an issue.

Jodi Hume:

But I so badly want to also be weaving in and I don't think it's

Jodi Hume:

something people seek out directly.

Jodi Hume:

So it has to be embedded in other services.

Jodi Hume:

It is okay.

Jodi Hume:

And it is normal to have these, what feel like outsized emotions.

Jodi Hume:

I had a client a couple months ago.

Jodi Hume:

favorite employee, who honestly he was like, we joked, he was like, I think

Jodi Hume:

I thought we were going to get like business married and have business

Jodi Hume:

babies and build this like big, but like they're just, he was attached,

Jodi Hume:

like we've all had that person who's Oh my gosh, now that I have this person,

Jodi Hume:

I can build this and it's so exciting.

Jodi Hume:

And that person left.

Jodi Hume:

And

Jodi Hume:

since then, he was like, I think I have abandonment issues

Jodi Hume:

because he's overreacting, someone comes in a nice outfit and he's

Jodi Hume:

Oh my God, are they interviewing?

Jodi Hume:

Are they going to leave me?

Jodi Hume:

We can laugh about that, but it's very real.

Jodi Hume:

And I think a lot of us have had that, but we don't talk about it.

Jodi Hume:

And so everyone thinks it's just them and that they're weird and that is not useful.

Dallas Burnett:

I think that if you hear the word leader, many times

Dallas Burnett:

you associate that with, uh, If if you're looking at leaders, you

Dallas Burnett:

think, wow, this person's got it all.

Dallas Burnett:

Then when you get to that point, you're like, wow, this feels very isolated and

Dallas Burnett:

very lonely or it can feel that way.

Jodi Hume:

and you have also imagined.

Jodi Hume:

Yeah.

Jodi Hume:

Yeah.

Jodi Hume:

And we also usually have imagined that like somehow those people know or or

Jodi Hume:

have more information, but the number of times where I'm listening to something.

Jodi Hume:

where someone from the general populace is reacting to a

Jodi Hume:

large scale issue of any kind.

Jodi Hume:

like we had a really bad storm come through here and a bunch of other states,

Jodi Hume:

not like you have had, this was years ago.

Jodi Hume:

it was just a derecho.

Dallas Burnett:

Yeah.

Jodi Hume:

but a bunch of other states sent, like trucks in and

Jodi Hume:

they were just like sitting.

Jodi Hume:

On at this one place for half a day and everyone was like up in arms, but

Jodi Hume:

like, why are they putting them to work?

Jodi Hume:

And all I can think of is have you ever tried to coordinate?

Jodi Hume:

like, if someone just sent you at your office, 12 more people

Jodi Hume:

to help, which would be great.

Jodi Hume:

in theory, that'd be great to have 12 more people.

Jodi Hume:

But you have to figure out what those 12 people are going to, like,

Jodi Hume:

where they go, how you coordinate them, and oh, they don't use the same

Jodi Hume:

system, so we can't, there's just so many ways that leadership from a not

Jodi Hume:

yet their place gets misunderstood, which is problematic There's so

Jodi Hume:

many layers to why this matters.

Jodi Hume:

as a leader, that's frustrating because you're often like if they

Jodi Hume:

knew what I knew, like they thought that option we picked was bad.

Jodi Hume:

They should have seen the other four options we had.

Jodi Hume:

Like they were way worse than this one.

Jodi Hume:

so there's that frustration and just be always feeling misunderstood.

Jodi Hume:

But it's also a problem because If that's what you're imagining, it's

Jodi Hume:

like a kid imagining that adulthood is this like amazing thing you arrive at,

Jodi Hume:

my son's I can't wait to be an adult.

Jodi Hume:

I was like, Mean, it definitely comes with a few perks, but mostly

Jodi Hume:

it just comes with a lot of stuff that you're not going to love.

Jodi Hume:

So enjoy kidhood while you got it.

Jodi Hume:

There's a little bit of that.

Jodi Hume:

So if you're imagining that leadership is this like thing,

Jodi Hume:

because leaders aren't talking about what it's really then you get there.

Jodi Hume:

And not only is it less fun, but you imagine that's because

Jodi Hume:

you're not cut out for it.

Jodi Hume:

Not because that's just what it is.

Dallas Burnett:

mm

Jodi Hume:

And that is when I, I mostly work with owners, but when I

Jodi Hume:

do work with emerging leaders, people just coming in almost 100 percent of

Jodi Hume:

the time, the first conversations are like, I've been talking about puberty.

Jodi Hume:

It's almost if no one told you about puberty, especially as a

Jodi Hume:

woman, and it just happened, you might think you were dying, right?

Jodi Hume:

You'd be like, this is not good.

Jodi Hume:

This is very bad.

Jodi Hume:

You're like, no, that's what happens.

Dallas Burnett:

just life.

Dallas Burnett:

That's normal.

Dallas Burnett:

yeah.

Jodi Hume:

it goes.

Jodi Hume:

And but I even saw this with a new CEO who hired me one time.

Jodi Hume:

And his discomfort was indescribable.

Jodi Hume:

And because partly he was like, Jodi, all I do is talk to people all day long.

Jodi Hume:

Like I'm not like getting anything done.

Jodi Hume:

And I was like, dude.

Jodi Hume:

That is your job now, like your job.

Jodi Hume:

Leadership is not an individual contributor position.

Jodi Hume:

is.

Jodi Hume:

It is about coordinating other people's help and whatever.

Jodi Hume:

So you have to be able to ask for help as a leader.

Jodi Hume:

So when it's isolating, I do say it should never be lonely at the top.

Jodi Hume:

I absolutely acknowledge that there are fewer people to talk to and there are

Jodi Hume:

things you have to keep to yourself.

Jodi Hume:

You can't tell everybody everything.

Jodi Hume:

there will be fewer people who understand you.

Jodi Hume:

There will be fewer people who understand what you are balancing.

Jodi Hume:

I hear that a lot with like tech startup founders who like none of their friends

Jodi Hume:

understand what they're grappling with.

Jodi Hume:

so all those things are true, but I still stand by.

Jodi Hume:

It should never be lonely at the top because those things are true and

Jodi Hume:

therefore you must Find the people and places that you can talk things

Jodi Hume:

through with and hear and normalize what this position is really like.

Jodi Hume:

because isolation, Or loneliness, but isolation, the breadth of study on

Jodi Hume:

what isolation does to the brain is nothing you want as an entrepreneur.

Jodi Hume:

Like I will not bore you with the neuroscience details, but it does

Jodi Hume:

nothing for your brain that you want happening to your brain in terms of

Jodi Hume:

being a really effective and maximizing your cognition as an entrepreneur,

Dallas Burnett:

I think that's, I think that's the key takeaway.

Dallas Burnett:

And that is that if it's not that there's not challenges to leadership that make

Dallas Burnett:

it unique and it doesn't necessarily feel the same because maybe you're viewed

Dallas Burnett:

different by your peers and they're not, you're not getting the calls to

Dallas Burnett:

go to happy hour or whatever, because now you're the boss or whatever, and so

Dallas Burnett:

that might feel lonely, but what you're saying is that, even though you might

Dallas Burnett:

feel lonely, if you're feeling that you're probably what you're feeling is

Dallas Burnett:

isolation and you can find other people that whether it's calling you on your

Dallas Burnett:

direct, the, what, what did you say?

Jodi Hume:

On

Dallas Burnett:

Yeah, on call Yeah.

Dallas Burnett:

If you want to call.

Dallas Burnett:

Jody on call, you call Jody on call, but if, or if it's getting into some group

Dallas Burnett:

or a mastermind or an executive round table, whatever, whatever it is, you just

Dallas Burnett:

have to be more intentional about that so that you are, you're not isolated.

Dallas Burnett:

I think it's not loneliness.

Dallas Burnett:

It's the

Jodi Hume:

It just creates a new problem.

Jodi Hume:

It's what's that say?

Jodi Hume:

every problem comes with, every solution comes with a

Dallas Burnett:

Yes.

Dallas Burnett:

Yes.

Jodi Hume:

So you have risen to this place and yes, now you have this new problem of

Jodi Hume:

isolation, but that doesn't mean you just put a period at the end of the sentence

Jodi Hume:

and be like, if it's isolating as a leader, no, you have to solve for that.

Jodi Hume:

You have to have ways.

Jodi Hume:

I tiny caveat to this.

Jodi Hume:

Not everyone.

Jodi Hume:

There are people who are internal.

Jodi Hume:

I still think you need people to talk to invent to insult to and so that

Jodi Hume:

you can hear that your experiences are normal and you're not just

Jodi Hume:

bad at your job.

Jodi Hume:

You're like, No, this is it's hard.

Jodi Hume:

It's going to.

Jodi Hume:

It's always going to be hard.

Jodi Hume:

but also there are some people who are internal processors who do not

Jodi Hume:

need as much To have someone to talk through their decisions or their

Jodi Hume:

ideas or to have a scratch paper placed to talk things through it.

Jodi Hume:

However, if you are a verbal processor, like which I am, good number of my

Jodi Hume:

clients are, you must if you are a verbal processor, And you allow yourself to stay

Jodi Hume:

in a stratosphere where you are isolated, I will say with enormous confidence

Jodi Hume:

your business will suffer because verbal processors quite literally need to talk.

Jodi Hume:

And as they talk, their brain goes to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to,

Jodi Hume:

and it will all come back though.

Jodi Hume:

That's when they can get to their best decision making.

Jodi Hume:

So just think of it as a need, as a must.

Dallas Burnett:

I love that.

Dallas Burnett:

I think that's great.

Dallas Burnett:

Again, just goes back to being intentional about not being isolated.

Dallas Burnett:

no matter what part of the leadership journey you're on, you're just,

Dallas Burnett:

you're constantly going back.

Dallas Burnett:

And every time you get that to the next level and next solution, you've

Dallas Burnett:

got these next challenges, you got to step out and be a little uncomfortable.

Dallas Burnett:

because whatever the uncomfortable situation is, that is presents itself

Dallas Burnett:

that you'll need to do to not be isolated is nowhere near what you will

Dallas Burnett:

face in, in uncomfort in isolation.

Dallas Burnett:

I think this has been a, Fantastic conversation.

Dallas Burnett:

I think that you have given a lot of people some insights on your three C's of

Dallas Burnett:

decision making and also some great topics on leadership and, and really self care

Dallas Burnett:

and being self aware about your state.

Dallas Burnett:

And we've talked about all kinds of stuff, not being isolated.

Dallas Burnett:

So I think this is, I think it's just been fascinating.

Dallas Burnett:

Now we ask

Dallas Burnett:

Number one, where, can people find you, if they want to connect?

Dallas Burnett:

And number two, we usually ask, we ask the guests of the last 10%,

Dallas Burnett:

if there's someone that they would like to hear on the last 10%,

Jodi Hume:

So, um, the best place if actually, so specifically for

Jodi Hume:

listeners to these podcasts that I do, I have a special page on my site.

Jodi Hume:

So the site is at the core.

Jodi Hume:

com.

Jodi Hume:

So you can read a bunch of stuff there in general, but if you go to at the core.

Jodi Hume:

com forward slash gift without an S at the end, which I was doing one of

Jodi Hume:

these interviews and I said gifts.

Jodi Hume:

And I was like, Oh wait, no, but I didn't think of it till later.

Jodi Hume:

So it's just gift with no S.

Jodi Hume:

not, I keep adding a bunch of different things there, but there's actually

Jodi Hume:

a little download for, that's based on the seven kinds of rest, which

Jodi Hume:

is more like a recharge document.

Jodi Hume:

And I.

Jodi Hume:

randomly scan that because I'm like, I know I'm run down.

Jodi Hume:

and I don't think I can rest because entrepreneurs are

Jodi Hume:

terrible at resting in general.

Jodi Hume:

so it's what do I need to recharge?

Jodi Hume:

There's a little like workbook there for that.

Jodi Hume:

you can also get 50 percent off any of the individual sessions that I do there.

Jodi Hume:

So there's codes for that.

Jodi Hume:

And then I randomly add like other little random gifts and

Jodi Hume:

like giveaways and things there.

Jodi Hume:

So

Dallas Burnett:

That's great.

Dallas Burnett:

We'll put that in the show notes then too.

Dallas Burnett:

We'll get that in the show notes

Jodi Hume:

you can connect with me on all the socials there and whatnot because I do

Jodi Hume:

randomly do like little calls and stuff.

Jodi Hume:

that's there.

Jodi Hume:

And then, who would I like to see on your show?

Jodi Hume:

Oh my goodness.

Jodi Hume:

I, so actually I will give you, I will give you two people, if that's okay.

Jodi Hume:

one is, one is Emily Arcus, who is a woman that I've met here in, in town.

Jodi Hume:

And she has some just really wonderful, insights on like

Jodi Hume:

how you grow people teams.

Jodi Hume:

And things, I, she knows a lot on the organizational development

Jodi Hume:

side of things, and I've learned a bunch of cool things from her.

Jodi Hume:

So I really like that.

Jodi Hume:

on the other side, I, if I had a daydream, so there's a woman, an author.

Jodi Hume:

Tara Schwart actually.

Jodi Hume:

she's a person out of M.

Jodi Hume:

I.

Jodi Hume:

T.

Jodi Hume:

Who studies like neuroscience and leadership and motivation and whatnot.

Jodi Hume:

And she is, she's definitely on my like if she's probably one of the few

Jodi Hume:

celebrities that if I saw in the wild, I would actually go talk to because I

Jodi Hume:

have substantive things to say to her.

Jodi Hume:

I will not go up to someone just simply to say, I really love your work and then have

Dallas Burnett:

Sure.

Dallas Burnett:

Sure.

Jodi Hume:

Afterwards, I find that really awkward and weird.

Jodi Hume:

but her, I have a list.

Jodi Hume:

I know exactly what I'd ask

Dallas Burnett:

Uh,

Jodi Hume:

For

Dallas Burnett:

excuse me for a second.

Dallas Burnett:

Can I take just the next 30

Dallas Burnett:

minutes of your time and

Dallas Burnett:

a

Jodi Hume:

it's just one question, can I ask you one question that I have for you?

Dallas Burnett:

awesome.

Dallas Burnett:

that's awesome.

Dallas Burnett:

Thank you for both of those, those names.

Dallas Burnett:

We'll have to, we'll have to reach out to, we'll reach out to both of those

Dallas Burnett:

and see if we can get them on the show.

Dallas Burnett:

And, and, we thank you for, thank you for sharing and thank you for your time, Jody.

Dallas Burnett:

This has been a fantastic conversation.

Dallas Burnett:

I know everybody's enjoyed it.

Dallas Burnett:

We appreciate you being on the last

Dallas Burnett:

10%.

Jodi Hume:

thanks for having me.

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About the Podcast

The Last 10%
Inspiring People, Coaching Teams, and Improving Cultures
Join The Last 10% for incredible conversations that help uncover the secrets of what it takes to finish well and finish strong. Our guests share their journeys, hardships, and valuable advice. We release new episodes every other Tuesday. If you are a leader, a coach, a business owner, or someone looking to level up, you are in the right place!

You can give 90% effort and make it a long way. But it’s the finding out how to unlock the last 10% that makes all the difference in your life, your relationships, and your work.

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Dallas Burnett