The Business of Mattering in the Workplace

0:00 The topics and opinions express in the following show are solely those of the hosts and their guests and not those of W FOURCY Radio. It's employees are affiliates. We make no recommendations or endorsements radio show, programs, services, or products mentioned on air or on our web. No liability, explicit or implied shall be extended to W FOURCY Radio or its employees are affiliates. Any questions or comments should be directed to those show hosts. Thank you for choosing W FOURCY Radio. What's working on Purpose? Anyway? Each week we ponder the answer to this question. People ache for meaning and purpose at work, to contribute their talents passionately and know their lives really matter. They crave being part of an organization that inspires them and helps them grow into realizing their highest potential.

0:45 Business can be such a force for good in the world, elevating humanity. In our program, we provide guidance and inspiration to help usher in this world we all want Working on Purpose. Now, here's your host, Doctor Relise Cortes. Welcome back to the Working and Purpose Program. Thanks for tuning again this week. Great to have you. This program has been on air since February twenty fifteen, and it is a pride and joy for me. I am your host, Doctorlie's Cortes. If we've not met yet, you don't know me. I am a management consultant, organizational LOCO therapist, speaker and author. My team and I at Gusto Now help companies to enliven and fortify their operations by articulating their purpose in building insurraged leaders and cultures activated by meeting and purpose to turn those companies from a flatline EKG to a vibrant destination workplace. There people are intrinsically motivated to perform with their best, grow into their fuller potential, and are committed to stay in dynamic to deliver on the company's mission. You can learn more about us and how we can work together at gustodashnow dot com or at least Coortes dot com. Now let's get in today's program. We have with us back again. Doctor Zach mccuriel. He is an author, researcher, and a consultant specializing in purposeful leadership, meaningful work, and positive organizational psychology. Author of The Invisible Leader, Transform Your Life, work an organization with the power of authentic purpose, and he works with companies, schools, and governments around the world to forge purposeful leaders and cultivate positive cultures that enable more meaning, mattering, motivation, well being, and performance. Today we're talking about the business and mattering in the workplace.

2:17 He joined it today from Denver, Zach. Welcome back to Working on Purpose. Thanks Lise. I'm looking forward to it. It's good to back. It's great to have you. But before we start, I have just one little pickle with you that I want to I want to go back to, and that is, you know, since I when I first met you, you did embarrass me in public. You may not know this, and here's how you did it. My friend, I'll take whatever apology you want to send me. But when I was reading your book, The Invisible Leader, I was on a long flight from Dallas to Australia from my vacation and there were so many great points in your book that I'm on the plane and I'm gesturing and I'm saying aloud, yes, that's right. This is people are looking at me like the crazy lady in Asle three. So just so you know, you have publicly embarrassed me. Well, I'm fine with that I'm not going to apologize for creating another person out there who's vocally and nonverbally excited about purpose. Okay, good, good, good, I've accomplished my mission.

3:14 Okay good. It was fun. It was great, gobs of fun. Good. Oh. So, for our listeners and viewers who don't know you yet the way that I do, because this is your second time on you were you were on in twenty eighteen, let's start with how you found your way into the purpose and mattering space. There's always the story there rust people, sure, and a lot of times that story comes with experiencing the lack of feeling a sense of purpose a service in the work. And for me, it started in my first job out of college. I was educated for success, which meant I was educated to get and acquire things, and I got it. I mean, I had a good job in advertising. Yet when I looked around, everybody was talking about what they did last weekend or what they were going to do the weekend coming up. And my brain could not compute that people lived for two sevens of their lives the weekend.

4:06 You know, I just couldn't let that go. And then also I got to be out in front of people. I was in sales, so I got to be out talking to really interesting human beings living very important lives who were thinking about using our services to build their businesses. But when I went back into the workplace, we had meetings that were really just about how much can I get from these people? Yeah, and I stopped and I just I thought to myself, you know, is this really all there is? And I had some interactions along the way where I realized that it's not all there is. You know, there are people who experience profound joy in what they're doing, whether it's from a custodian, a taxi cab driver, or a bus driver, a CEO, but they tend to have something in common.

4:57 I was finding is that they focus on their contribution rather than what they're doing. They focus on what they impact through their contribution. And that led me, you know, that realization led me on the track that I'm on now, which one was to make sure nobody ended up like me again and didn't ask those bigger questions. But two, how can we create environments where everybody can readily see both their humanity and their significance. And I do that in a couple of ways. I do research as a fellow in the Center for Meeting and Purpose at Colorado State University. There is such a center. And then the rest of my time is I'm out with organizations helping to turn the common sense idea of making sure people feel valued and know how they add value into common practice. Well, I love it and we have similar stories, but I'm not going to go into mind because I want to extract as much as I can out of you on this program. So next now, since we're talking about the world of work, both you and I I riveted on the world of work where we do spend a lot of our time in our life. And I love your articles you're on your blog, zachs are fantastic and you have a very powerful story in one of your articles here where you talk about the supposed unmotivated maintenance workers who were tasked with washing their building's bottom floor windows. I think it would be incredibly compelling and situating for you to share that story here. Yes, all behavior issues are inevitably systems and cultural issues. You know, we can't separate the two. Oftentimes we say

6:28 what's wrong with these people right? Versus what's wrong with our environment? Right? When I was asked to work with a group of maintenance workers. The supervisor said to me, hey, Zach, these these people are unmotivated. And one of the responsibilities of these maintenance workers is to clean the bottom floor windows of this industrial complex building that's on the corner in the summer, every single morning, so it's a task they wake up to. And as I went into this group, I simply said, hey, you know, if you were running this place, what would you do differently? And let me tell you something. I did not see an unmotivated group of workers. They had more ideas than I could even count. They just hadn't ever been asked for their voice before. And one woman followed me out and she goes, Zach, I think I figured it out. I figured out what's going on in our team. She said. In my first week on the job, I was tasked with that client cleaning those bottom floor windows. And I noticed at three pm every afternoon, the sprinkler system would come on and it was aimed wrong, and so it would leave avoidable water splotches which I would have to clean the next day. And she said, I was so excited.

7:38 I went to my supervisor and I said, hey, I have an idea, let's aim the sprinklers differently. She said that. The supervisor looked at her and said, that's not our problem, that's the sprinkler people's problem. I need you to just do your job, she said. For the next five years, she put her head down and she got through her work. So was this an unmotivated worker. No, this was a worker who experienced anti mattering, the experience of her voice not being heard, of her not being significant. And when people experience insignificance, it results in two things. Acts of withdrawal quiet quitting, for example, was the inevitable withdrawal response of people who feel insignificant or acts of desperation. Hey I do matter. I'm going to complain, I'm going to gossip, I'm going to do all these things you're telling me not to do. But their natural human reactions to the instinct to matter being unmet. And that's what we see, I think in workplaces at large right now. I mean the recent the work Human came out with an invisibility report and found that almost forty percent of people feel invisible at work. Wow. Wow, Okay, so let's unpack them. There's a couple of things I want to say about that. So I can't how demoralizing, how incredibly demoralizing. She's coming with a solution to a very stupid problem that is very very unavoidable, and she's told basically to go pound sand.

9:07 And so the way when I hear that, Zach, what I hear is what a waste of a precious life. This is a person's precious life. She could be doing so much more with her beautiful contributions than just going through those motions if she had somebody who actually listened to her, cared and found some way to be able to employ her solution. And it didn't happen. And what's sad about it is the supervisor probably doesn't remember it, but it has held onto her soul for five years. Yes, exactly, That's what I mean about the one the waste of somebody's one precious life, exactly. And when people experience anti mattering in the place where they spend a third of their waking lives, it inevitably affects how they make meaning in life, how they parent, how they come home, how they're in our communities. I mean, there's a lot of talk about purpose out there and organizations finding their call. I think the most important social cause of an organization is to ensure people feel seen, heard, and valued in the place where they spend one third of their only life. Yeah, I completely align with that. That's part of the reason I'm an organizational logo therapist, so I totally get that.

10:16 One of the other things I love about your work, Zach, is that you define and situate these kinds of terms like mattering in a very accessible way. I think a lot of people hear the word mattering and it registers as something, but they don't really know what it means, and so I love your definition. Will you share with us your definition of what is mattering. Mattering is the belief that we're significant to the world around us. That comes from two things, feeling valued by those around us and knowing exactly how we add value to those around us. It's important when we're in this discussion not to think of mattering as a trend or a touchy feely, fluffy idea or a generational preference. When you were born as a baby, the first thing that you did, researchers find is you tilted your head upward to look for someone to care for you. The first thing you did as a human being. You did not look for food, you looked to matter. Nobody would be listening to this program right now if they didn't at some point in their life procure mattering to another human being. It is a fundamental survival instinct, and that's why when that survival instinct to matter is not met, like it wasn't met for that maintenance worker, just like not eating for a prolonged period of time, our bodies going to survival mode. So many people right now are withdrawing or acting out in desperation for the significance they're not getting a lot of people right now. Loneliness is a hot topic, and the answers

11:46 to loneliness are really misguided. A lot of the books on loneliness tell you to go get put yourself out there, develop more opportunities for social connections, which is all great, but what we know is that it's not necessarily more social connections that matter. It's feeling significant to the people that are in your social sphere right now. So it's not about how many, it's about how you feel significant to those who are around you. And that's why mattering literally comes first as humans, and that's why it must come first for anything else to happen. It's almost impossible for anything to matter, no matter how compelling your work is or your organization's mission is, it's almost impossible for anything to matter to a human being who doesn't first believe that they matter. Yeah, and to bring that home even more further, ladies and gentlemen, you know, Zach, you write about it as a mattering instinct. Now, when you add the word instinct to something you really understand, well, you just can't talk yourself out of it. I mean sort of. It's just that necessary, that required, it is, and it's again, it's about as touchy feeling as feeding someone who's hungry for launch. And organizations on mass have been overlooking this instinct. And part of the reason why is because we've seen work as just work. Right, this is work and this is life.

13:13 And we've told ourselves that to ease the burden of responsibility. Because when we tell ourselves that becomes easier for us to to humanize people as leaders. And if you're an individual, you can say, oh, it's just my job. We get condition to expect less and that works well for the organization especially, But there's no work in life. I mean, think about that. It's still life occurs wherever a human being is breathing and thinking and their hearts beating, and that includes work. So I think if we don't create organizations and adopt the leadership skills to ensure everyone around us feels like they matter and they are skills, we are failing to meet the most fundamental instinct of human beings. I completely agree, and again because I like the way that you provide. Your language provides such accessibility, which means once you get the successibility, then we can learn ways to be able to dress this. So you list three primary drivers of mattering at work, let's talk about those briefly.

14:20 Yeah. So, the first is that we have to feel seen, right, we have to feel absolutely There is a big difference between knowing somebody and noticing them. Though you know, I can know my best friend but not notice that they're struggling or suffering. It's important to recognize that noticing is the deliberate act of paying attention to the ebbs and flows and details of people's lives and then showing them that you've thought about them. The second is affirming people, so showing people how they're significant. I was just writing a chapter and I was writing about Dave Beggers, the author National Book Award winner. He was a Pulitzer Prize finalist. He's written over eleven books, but he writes about that it was six words from a junior high school English teacher below a grade on his first type assignment that nudged him on the whole path he was on. And those six words words are I hope you become a writer.

15:24 I hope you become a writer. Right, And that's affirmation. Affirmation is when people show us the evidence of our significance. Yes, beautiful. And then the final piece is showing people how they're needed. Because when people feel replaceable, don't be surprised if they act replaceable, right, right, And a lot of people are deluded into thinking that this was a great resignation, and all the data indicates that it was not a great resignation. Over the last three years, it was a demand for dignity. Oh I love that. And people left uncaring leaders, degrading jobs, and disrespect cultures. They but they went back into the workforce. It was a it was a demand for dignity. People were no longer willing to give up their humanity for an extra twenty five cents on the hour, so agreeable, noticed, affirmed, and needed. And there are a lot of practices we can dig into under each of those. But it's a great way. You know, it's not the only model of mattering out there, but I think models are helpful because now it elevates us into being able to think about this as a practice.

16:30 We can ask a benchmarking question of ourselves. Am I making sure that people around me feel noticed, affirmed and needed every day? Yes? On that note, let's let people kind of chew on that. There. I'm your host, doctor at Least Cortez, who went on a year with doctor Zach mccurio. He is an author, researcher, and consultant specializing in purposeful leadership, meaningful work, and positive organizational psychology. We've been getting into the under the hood, if you will, on mattering after the raak, we're going to kick it off with distinguishing mattering from self esteem and belong Stay with this will be right back. Doctor Elise Cortes is a management consultant specializing in meaning and purpose. An inspirational speaker and author, she helps companies visioneer for greater purpose among stakeholders and develop purpose inspired leadership and meaning infused cultures that elevate fulfillment, performance, and commitment within the workforce. To learn more or to invite a lease to speak to your organization, please visit her at Elisecortes dot com.

17:40 Let's talk about how to get your employees working on purpose. This is working on Purpose with doctor Elise Cortes. To reach our program today or to open a conversation with Elise, send an email to a lease a Lise at Elise court Tes dot com. Now back to working on Purpose. Thanksteresting with us, and welcome back to working on purpose. I'm your host, doctor Release Cortes, as I too, am dedicated to creating a world where people realize the potential at work and are and feel dignified and appreciate it. And they are led by inspirational leaders that help them find and contribute their greatness.

18:22 And we do business at Betters the World. I keep writing my own books and researching as well. So my latest one came out in March of twenty three. It's called a Great Revitalization, How activating meaning and purpose can radically in liven your business. And I wrote it for business leaders to help them really understand what Zach's talking about here, how the world of work has radically changed, And that's the first part of the book. And then I offer twenty two best practices to help you actually create environment to meet that. So you can find that on Amazon or one of my websites at least Coortes dot com if you are just joining us. My guest is Zach mccurio is the author of various articles in the book The Invisible Leader, Transform your life, work and organization with the Power of Authentic Purpose, and has another book coming out soon. Looking forward to that. Zach. Okay, So, one of the other things that I like to hear about when I'm out doing my work, though, the notion of belonging has become very very significant, And I like how you distinguish mattering from belonging in self esteem. So let's do that now too. Yeah. I can feel like I belong on this show right now, but I could also feel not significant to you. Right.

19:25 We can feel like we belong somewhere and are accepted somewhere, and are represented somewhere, but not feel significant to members of that group. That's right, and that's why belonging somewhere in a group makes it easier, probably to experience mattering. But if the people in the group don't have the skills to show me the evidence of my significance, then I may still feel like I don't matter though I belong. So it's very different. And again it's more elemental. It's this idea that I am significant. I'm significant enough to even want to belong. So what's interesting, Zach, I'm just glanced over at my top ten values that I have prioritized. My number one value is significance.

20:08 Yeah, my number one. I love that. I love that, and it's not surprising to me, right of course, given what we do. Right of course, right, But it also should be it should be number one because it does come first. Like, for example, we want people to do things like find their purpose. Well, it's hard for someone to find their contribution if they don't first believe they're worthy of contributing. It's hard for someone to share their voice if they don't first believe their voice is significant. We want people to soar with their strengths. Well, it's very hard for an individual to discover or uncover their strengths if they don't first believe they have strengths. Right, And so I love that significance is number one because it really is the leading indicator of almost every lagging indicator that we say we want out of people and our organizations. So love this the sec when you know you realize you're not going anywhere once the show finishes, right, you know you're stuck with me, You know that. So now if we distinguish self esteem, of course you say that that self esteem is the confidence in our worth and a build is that we know we have this, and so it's what we know about ourselves. And I love so significance And then actually you break this down actually somewhere significance is there's a twofold piece of it where it's a matter of knowing that tell me the difference there's the two and knowing how you add value. Yes, that's it. That's exactly what I want you to say. I think that's really really critical, really quick fast story.

21:33 So how I learned about meaning I can't resist is when I was twenty six years old, I lived in Brazil and then well actually spanding in Brazil. I had the life in Brazil that everybody says they want, you know, I have a live in what we called the major, a housekeeper, a chauf for a gardener, a very nice lifestyle. I'm traveling all over South America. I don't have a work fisis, so I'm studying now. You would think that would be just fantastic, but was just one really big gaping problem. And you know what it was. I was miserable most of that time because I was consuming life. I was taking from it. What I needed was to give to myself, of myself to it in order to be fulfilled. And I wasn't doing that. That was the piece that was missing. I wasn't mattering, and you were going, and inevitably you feel that tension. That tension we feel is simply the biological markers of not fulfilling our function. Right like you're we are built to be interconnected and contribute to one another. We're not built to acquire and achieve for ourselves. So when we're not fulfilling that function, you get all of these things, these like these indicators, the lights go off, the check engine light comes on, right, and you know you're not you're actually not doing you're not using yourself the way you're meant to be used and well exactly and you even go on to say that, which I what made me think about this is you say how anti mattering destroys energy, undercut self self were reduced to self esteem and can predict unhealthy stress, clinical anxiety, and depression. Well, you know,

23:06 we have a major loneliness problem, depression problem here all over the world, actually in a major opiate problem. If we could just elevate mattering, just to smidge, I think it would really make a big difference. Yeah. So, unfortunately, what's happened, and this ties into your question about self esteem. What's happened in the ninety nineties when the self esteem movement was popular, and I was a kid who grew up in the nineties, and I remember going to assemblies that said believe in yourself. And those assemblies were driven by research by sociologists that having a sense of self worth was important. But what those researchers did not get into, and they will admit this now, is they didn't get into the sources of self esteem. And you can't believe in yourself. You can't have a belief if your environment doesn't provide you evidence of that belief. Yeah, beliefs to be upheld require our environment giving us the real evidence of our belief. So self esteem is the belief in oneself and one's worth. But I just can't sit here on my own and say all right, I'm gonna believe in myself and go do that because that can be detached from reality. What's more beneficial to develop self esteem is to be in relationships in which people give us the real evidence of how we are significant, the real evidence of how we are unique, the real evidence of the impact we make. And that's why true self esteem is a lagging indicator of mattering, of experiencing mattering from someone else. So I'm glad you brought

24:36 that up. Yeah, you remind me, Zach. It's it's been an interesting journey of my own, as you know, self discovery and self development. But in my own programs, one of the things that I like to teach, especially for managers that's new managers, Destinia directors, is to be able to literally give feedback to someone in a way that shows them that they aren't to all. You're saying that they're seen, that they are appreciated, that their uniqueness is fully registered and and and and and displayed back to them, and the way that you know that you've delivered that really, really strongly and effectively, is what Zach, Oh, like you're asking what, yeah if The way that you know if you've delivered that extremely effectively to the other person is when the person is when the person cries, yeah, right, when they get moved, when they get yeah, they get moved to tears because they feel seen to their soul is so beautiful and so powerful, and people can learn to do that. You teach it, I teach it, and it's so important and compelling and it's so accessible. Right, how many how many listeners say thank you are a good job to people every day most of us. That really doesn't do much. I'm glad you're doing it, but it really psychologically doesn't do much. But when we can say, hey, here's when and where this happened. Here is what you actually did.

26:03 Here are the unique gifts that I noticed, and here's the impact that it had on me and had on other people, that's where you developed the emotion. Or when you are giving critical feedback. A lot of people think, Zach, you know, you talk about mattering, but critique is so important and it is the problem is when we critique before we care. Yeah, oh, that is the problem because one of the biggest predictors of trust is feeling cared for by the person that I'm supposed to trust. In fact, a lot of research says if that's not present, then trust is almost impossible. So I am not going to trust your feedback if I don't first feel cared for by you. A special officer once told me, special Forces officer responsible for training in like really deadly situation, said Zach, the key ingredient for a lethal unit, high performing unit behind enemy lines is not toughness, it's love. People will not sacrifice for me if I don't know their kids' names. People will not People will not go the extra mile for me if I don't know their struggles and offer help along the way. And that practice of caring is so important. So when you're giving critical feedback, you can say, hey, here's the situation. Here is the behaviors, here's the impact in an act. But hey, here are the strengths I know you have. Here are some alternative behaviors. Here is the alternative impact that you

27:36 could have on people. I want that for you, right, And I think this is so important for anybody who might be sort of sitting out here a bit on the naysayer front, going, yeah, this mattering stuff sounds really nice, but you know, at the end of the day, we've got to produce results, right, you do, And what I would say and I know you'll echo, this is when we demonstrate that we care for someone, when we do give them constructive feedback. We can literally say, you know, almost anything to that person and they will receive it as long as they understand we care about them and we're delivering this because we care about them and because we know that they can do and be. More absolutely, I mean, think about the best teachers you've had, the best coaches you've had, the best leaders that you had. It all comes down to caring.

28:22 In fact, there's some research in a great book. It's about what really predicts toughness, and there's some research on NBA coaches and their players, and they were looking at the most resilient, high performing teams and it was the NBA coaches that fostered inclusion, safety, that connected and knew each player's name, that texted their players to let them know they were doing a lineup change and asking their opinion on it before they did it. That cultivated toughness. And resilience, not the people that were out there telling people to be off and running them into the ground. Again, you can't critique before you care completely inlign with that. Okay, So we've been speaking really on sort of a conceptual ideological format. Now I want to get into sort of the how to the application piece of this, which you do beautifully and so important for people to be able to walk away today and put the stuff to work.

29:23 So you talk about, you know, how we can actually counteract these experiences of anti mattering, that we have to root out these insidious moments and consciously work to create experiences of mattering. So let's talk a little bit about what that looks like in the workplace, which is kind of give us a couple of examples, right, So let's look at the noticing, affirming and needing framework the noticing people. The first thing is make sure that you create the space to actually see people right. Research finds our attention spans are down twenty five percent in general in the last decade. In two thousand and four, you got about two minutes of undivided attention on a task. Now you get an average about forty seven seconds. The same is true with people.

30:04 So when we are interacting with people, if we don't create the space to slow down, give ourselves the opportunity to notice and see them, then seeing them will be impossible. It won't be possible to see people. So we have to slow down and learn how to pay attention again. One way to do that is to ask better questions. Yeah, how are you? As a greeting, it's not a question anymore? Right? So I observe leaders all the time, and here's how most leaders start their meetings. How's everybody doing? Good? Can you imagine if you weren't good? Not me right, you wouldn't You would have raised your hand and say that. Or people say hey, how are you? How's everybody doing? And there's ten people in the room, and then they just go on with the agenda. But if you ask, hey, at least, what is your attention today?

30:55 What have you been thinking most about today? What have you been working on today? What have you been struggling with today? Can I help we get the data to see people? So that's something you can do right now, ask better questions. The FedEx driver that comes and drops off your package, instead of just saying hey, thanks, you could say hey, what's your name again? How many stops have you had today? How are you doing, how's the work going? It like just those little moments can make a big difference. So create space to check in, ask better questions. And then the other piece I would say is that use proactive compassion. What I mean by that is that empathy is like understanding what someone's going through their struggle, but compassion is offering an action to alleviate that struggle. One of the things I help leaders do is I help them actually map out the anticipated struggles they see their people having in the next quarter, next couple weeks, and what then I have them write down what signs they should be looking for.

31:53 But then what's really powerful is I have them write down their resources and actions they can take to alleviate that struggle. What's great, what's powerful about that practice is that a it helps people be a noticer already in the practice. Part of that the process is the point. But also what it does is it gives people the opportunity to see where they might not be meeting people where they need it. They might not be meeting those struggles because so often people say, oh, that's just our industry, that's the way the quarter is, once we get through this quarter will be fine again. Like you said, no, that's one that's one person's only life. Yeah, you said something in your first book that really struck me. And then I'll say this and we'll grab our last break. I think you said something, and you correct me because I know you have it. But this is just from memories act. This is how I'm just serving. I didn't look this up before we got on the program. You said something like a manager's job is to improve the quality of forty percent of a person's life. Yeah, the chief job. Obviously they need to achieve results. But again it's important to understand and that if there's no human well being, there are no results. Every single result is mediated through a human being, right, and human well being is what creates the energy needed to produce So every single lagging indicator is the result of the leading indicator of how a human feels. I love it.

33:19 On that note, let's let them think about that. We'll just grab our last break. I'm your host, doctor e Les Cortes. We've been on the air with doctor Zach mccurio. He's an author, researcher, and consultant specializing in purposeful leadership, meaningful work, and positive organizational psychology. We've been talking a bit about just the import of mattering and what leaders can do about that in the workplace. Now, after the break, we're going to get into how can we actually help those leaders become more caring and able to do this sort of thing. Stay what we write back. Doctor Elise Cortes is a management consultant specializing in meaning and purpose. An inspirational speaker and author, she helps companies visioneer for greater purpose among stakeholders and develop purpose inspired leadership and meaning infused cultures that elevate fulfillment, performance, and commitment within the workforce.

34:19 To learn more or to invite Elise to speak to your organization, please visit her at elisecortes dot com. Let's talk about how to get your employees working on purpose. This is working on Purpose with doctor Elise Cortes. To reach our program today or to open a conversation with Elise, send an email to Elise alisee at elisecortes dot com. Now back to working on purpose. Thanksteresting with us, and welcome back to working on Purpose. I'm your host, doctor Elise Cortes. I mentioned in the last break about my latest book called The Great Revitalization. What I did for you to accompany that is, I created a three page self assessment that you could download from my website to be able to see the extent to which your organization is meeting the discerning standards of today's workforce. You can find it at gustodashnow dot com if you're just joining in the program. I guess to Zach mccurio. He's the author of various fantastic articles. I might say in the book The Invisible Leader, transform your life, work and organization with the power of authentic purpose. So for this last segment here, Zach, I really want to get into the leaders themselves.

35:30 I mean, it's tough being a leader. You know that you and I both work with leaders, and there's a lot of pressure on them, and there's a lot of you know, wire leaders so bad and how come they're not? Why don't they care and whatever. So for this bit here, I want to get into what's under that for them and how we can actually help our leaders do and utilize these practices that you're putting forth. So let's start there. You also talk about there's no sugar of you know, the be caring advice for leaders that we need them to be more human and care more. So first, let's start with that, this notion of why we're seeing so much conversation out there about that need. Yeah, if I were a leader, i'd be annoyed by myself, you know, like, hey, notice people affirm, people show them that they're needed, and it's like, yeah, I get it. But you know, as a McKinsey study found, most managers are spending about I think it was like thirty percent of their time or so actually having time to manage people. Yeah, and the rest is on strategic plans or other deliverables, strategic objectives, tactics, other things that they need to deliver to upper management. So one of the problems, one of the big barriers to caring is that our environments don't make it possible to care. Right, So, environment determines behavior, or it makes behavior possible. If you're tracking every minute of someone's day, if you're in a hospital setting and you're starting to do your rewards and incentives based on efficiency how fast you get in and out of a patient's room, and then it's going to be very hard for that clinician to stop and check in with

37:00 a nurse that they're working with. So we have to look at our environment and say, how does our environment make it impossible to care? And how can we reoptimize our environment to make it possible for care. So that's a huge one. The other one is simply energy. Leader's energy. Attention and energy are the leader's scarcest resources, and so what are we asking leaders to spend their energy on? And then I think that the last key barrier, and this one goes back to the leader themselves. It's sometimes the courage to care. Yeah, courage takes a lot of energy. Sometimes you have to take captive what you can control. And some people may say, well, Zach, I don't have a leader that does this for me, And I would say, do you do it for them? If we're trying to create culture, culture is generated, it is not prescribed form above. So think about the interactions to the left of you, to the right of you, and above you, and are you making sure people feel noticed, affirmed and needed, Because what you'll find is that there'll be a collective energy that comes back to you if you create a micro climate of optimizing these interactions. So one thing as you're thinking about this whole conversation is to not think about this as some initiative or program. That's what's great about it. It's simply about optimizing the interactions and moments you already have, and that should lessen the burden

38:31 a little bit. And where you can say, hey, how can I notice someone today? How can I affirm them? How can I show them they're needed in that next interaction? It doesn't really take more time, It takes better use of time and an intentionality too. So you talk about calendaring every week some time to check in and connect with your team members, and so what I do something similar like you use the calendar for your own task. It's an appointment you have with yourself in this case, to be able to extend care and connection to your team. And you know, to your point, if if an organization is all about optimizing efficiency and effectiveness, that they've eradicated the possibility that you can actually be a caring leader, Well, you've manufactured the problem in this organization, yes, right, And but you can also, if you're that leader in that system, find those moments, yes, find those interactions. You know. Elvis Presley once said when things go wrong, don't go with them, right, you can. I love that, right because like you can find the moments that you can optimize to show people around you that they feel like they matter. And guess what, the likelihood of your results being better because of that will likely be higher.

39:43 What I see in organizations all the time, and I work with a lot of middle managers who are trying to do the right thing and a system that incentivizes them not to yes, and they try to do the right thing. But what happens is they implement this, they start instituting it, and then someone always above goes, what are you well doing over there? And that's we can say, oh, let me tell you, And that's how movements can start. So you are more powerful than you think, You have more influence than you think. But research also says we tend to under emphasize and under emphasize our own impact. Yeah, I'm just going to go there, totally go there. And you kind of refer to that, and you're one of your articles as a self esteem problem. So and it's so interesting, right, leaders oftentimes radically underestimate their potency with their people. A word, a look, or lack therap can make such a difference, you know, and so that the ripple effect that that can be cast. And then on the other side of that that I want to treat here because you and I both serve leaders, we both care and nurture and develop leaders well. And so you go on to say in one of your articles, we can't expect leaders to care if they don't feel cared for themselves. Yes, that's why when I talk to employees, I tell them, first thing, the best way to practice this is to do all this for your leader. We spend way too much time telling leaders what they should be doing for employees, and far far less time than I think is enough on helping to create norms of how employees treat their leaders. Because to create communities of mattering, everybody has

41:16 to take responsibility. And that's actually an empowering idea once peop will get over the fear of it. Yeah, I was just about to say that, I love that there's agency in that, and you're activating the human spirit, the contribution. And again, so now we're giving value to other people like you talk about. So I completely agree with that. And the other thing that I like to say with that too is we can teach our leaders how we want them to lead us. If we want to have if we want better more specific feedback and how we can get better, or what we're doing well, we can teach them how to deliver that or tell them that that's important. So I love what you're distinguishing here, and it is a way to help serve our leaders, right. We help teach them, we help support them, and the leader gets the data on what they can continue doing when we notice them, affirm them and show them that we need them.

42:05 Like if I go to my leader, if I were to poll, this would be interesting and I'm going to do this in the future. But if I were to poll and ask them how many how often do you get positive feedback from your the people under your care, I would be surprised if it's very much. And that's got to be difficult, right to not see the evidence of your significance and only see the evidence of where you don't quite measure up to what someone's expecting. And so again, it's impossible for anything to matter to someone who doesn't believe that they matter. And that's the same is true with your leader in your organization. So before you bring your concern to them. Does your leader know that they matter to you? Oh? So, Zach, this is so good, This is so good. So you know, everyone listening to this, you probably have somebody that you know, you report to, whether you're you're the boss, the owner, whatever it is, there's somebody that's it's your chief client or whatever it is. Have you how often do you say, you know what I really appreciate about you?

43:09 How often have you opened with a conversation like that? So what I appreciate about this second? I didn't want to miss the opportunity because we also we want to be able to empower, embolden strength, and encourage leaders to do what you're putting forth. So this is essential commentary essential because this is actually on leadership practice is to empower your people to be active participants in the culture they say they want instead of passive recipients of it, right, right, And that's that is that is what a good leader does, is they show them that this is this is bi directional. Culture is not prescribed by role. It's developed through relationships with one another m HM. And that's a powerful charge and it takes the author It takes a lot of the burden off of the leader, that culture is shared. Yeah, not just not just I'm just responsible for it. Yeah, we're in this together, right, Yeah, it creates that sense of common purpose. Yeah, yes, I love all that we all want. First exactly, I will say, if there are five words you can use that are incredibly powerful. So we've talked about some practices with noticing, talked about some practice with affirming positive feedback, but for needing people like say these five words. If it wasn't for you to somebody to your leader, Hey, I just want to let you know, like this week, if it wasn't for you, this would have never happened. And see what happens. You will see the power of a moment of matter. And if you say those five words. Yeah. And the other thing along those lines that I like about what you say in your articles

44:40 and completely aligned with two is to tell people when they're not around that you miss them, You noticed that they weren't there. Gosh, we really needed you at the strategy meeting yesterday. Man, you're the person that always brings the great ideas, and man, it was flat without you exactly, or someone was absent, right, or someone was on leave. And I've actually spoken to this about a company who helps organizations manage maternity leave. And I've heard this from working mothers all the time, where they come back into the workforce and people treat them like, oh, it's you know, I wish you wish you had never left, But they don't say anything about what happened during the time they were gone. So like little things like saying, hey, you know, we had this meeting yesterday and there was this thought, this idea that came up made me think about you. You're really good at thinking through these things. I wanted to run it by you. You know, just that to be thought about huge is so powerful instead of being forgotten, because when people recognize the significance of their absence, they are also intern recognizing the significance of their presence. So true instead of just saying like, oh, I hope you had a nice vacation. That was great, or you know, we got it, we got everything taken care of while you're gone. That that's a nice thing to say. I might alleviate pressure if someone goes on vacation, but it does lead people to think, oh, well, I guess I'm replaceable. Yeah yeah, and also invisible, Okay, we're almost at a time. Two more questions. I got to know when the next book is coming out and what it's generally about, because you'll

46:13 have to come back and talk about that too. Well, we're finalizing a publisher right now, but it's coming out in spring twenty twenty five, okay, And it's all about how mattering comes first, how leaders can fill the human need for significance. I love it. Well, you know you can run, but again, hid and I'm a pretty fast runner, so I'm going to come get you and bring you back. So you know, this show is listened to people around the world, and they care about their experience of work. They care about elevating for their people. Many of them are interested in doing business a betters in the world along the way. What would you like to leave them with today? It starts with your next interaction. Great leadership is really about optimizing interactions. Sounds good to me, beautiful incredible moments of life than the moments of life. I'm actually co authoring a book about that myself. So I love fun fun Zach. It is really really amazing to have you come back on the show again. I am a fan of your work. You are making a difference in the world. You are elevating humanity, you are elevating the experience of work, and I'm really happy to know you and Katy as a friend. You too, Thanks Elise.

47:20 You're welcome. Listeners and viewers. You'll learn more about this amazing man, Zach mccurio, the work that he does in organizations, his book or articles. You can start by visiting his website. It's Zach mccurio dot com. Let me spell that for you, Zach z A C H. Mccurio is me E R c u are io Zach mccurio dot com. Last week, you've missed the live show, you can always catch it if you recorded podcast. We're on the air with Susan Ford Collins, an executive coach, author and speaker. She's the creator of the Technology of Success, in which she teaches ten critical skills she learned from highly successful people. She has authored several books, including her latest blur Clear The Way Ahead Even in the Worst Times, which we talked about on the program, along with some of the ten skills she teaches. Was an incredibly encouraging, energizing and illuminating conversation. She's a little spitfire. Next week We'll be on the air with William van der Blowman, who has run an executive search and recruiting firm for years and learned ten data driven habits that separate the best leaders from the rest. We'll be talking about these habits, which he writes about in his book Be the Unicorn.

48:22 See you there and remember work as one of the best adventures and means of realizing her potential and making the impact with Crave. So let's work on Purpose. We hope you've enjoyed this week's program. Be sure to tune into Working on Purpose featuring your host, doctor Elise Cortes, each week on W four C. Why Together We'll create a world where business operates conscientiously, Leadership inspires and passion performance, and employees are fulfilled in work that provides the meaning and purpose they crave. See you there, Let's work on Purpose.