What Makes a Great Leader?

0:06 - For your extra shot of leadership today, Kim and I are going to answer the question, what makes a great leader? Hey, Kim, what is going on?

0:18 - Hey, Pepper. It is our 1st 1st episode, and I could not be more excited to just let this go.

0:25 - I'm ready to go. I've prepared. I'm curious about your perspective on this. I'm ready to share my perspective. I want to dig into this a little bit. So I say let's just jump right in.

0:36 - Yeah. So let's jump right into what makes a great leader.

0:40 - Yeah. This is a great question. There's good leaders, there's bad leaders. There's all sorts of leaders. But really, what separates the good from all the rest in your mind? In my mind, what is the differentiator and I've got three of them that I have been thinking about. I'm ready to talk to you a little bit about hear your thoughts.

1:00 - Yeah. Okay. That's cool. I've got two. So you just start with her. What's your number one?

1:04 - All right. My number one is I think great leaders have a high level of self awareness. All right. And what I mean by that is they understand themselves. They've taken some time to really dig deep and think about who they are and who they are not. And they're comfortable in that skin. They know what they bring to the table. They know their skills, their abilities, their strengths, their opportunities, their weaknesses, things that they need to continue to work on. And they are fine with it. They know what they bring. So I think high level of self awareness. The other piece that I would talk a little bit about with high level of self awareness is they understand their emotions. Great leaders, in my mind, they know what their hot buttons are. They know what gets them hot under the collar. They know how to maintain a high level of composure under stress and pressure. As leaders, we all are faced with stress and pressure. I think great leaders maintain composure in those moments. I for 01:00 a.m. A leader that I continue to work on that in my past, there have been moments where I've lost my stuff. Right. You've experienced some of that and maybe we missed a deadline. Maybe something didn't come the way we were expecting it to. And yeah, I didn't have any self control in those moments. I allowed my emotions to run away with me. So I think high levels of self awareness, who they are, why they have certain emotions around what issues, things, situations when those arise, and they demonstrate a high level of self control. That's number one for me right out of the gate. That is a great leader.

2:46 - Absolutely. You've got to be able to control your emotions. That's part of that emotional intelligence conversation, right?

2:52 - Yeah. Daniel Goldman, it's a great book.

2:55 - Yeah. So what was your number two?

2:57 - All right. Number two is great leaders create other leaders.

3:02 - Nice.

3:03 - They are focused on building other leaders, honing other folks that are working with them to take on bigger leadership roles. To me, at the end of the day, great leaders think about others. They think about the other people that they are working with. And they're not necessarily focused on themselves and what they need to be doing, but they are really purposefully, deliberately thinking about their team. And they inspire others through their own work, through their own behaviors. For me, leaders make other leaders.

3:37 - So Pepper, that just takes me right back to the other day when we were sharing some leadership quotes back and forth, and there was one about leaders inspiring others. And it really got me to think about, do I inspire others? Am I a good leader? Am I a great leader? And that quote was something like, if you inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more, and become more, then you are a leader. And so I was like, okay, do I do those things? So I think you're right on the target with those leaders are just really focused on really impact. Are they impacting people to do something different? Which is kind of what this podcast is all about, is inspiring leaders to do something a little bit different with their leadership. How do they really make an impact? How do they inspire? How do they help others grow?

4:28 - Yes. And so in my mind, leaders are teaching other leaders to be great leaders. That's their focus. They're not just focused on their own leadership.

4:37 - Yeah. You don't have to have the title manager, supervisor, director to be able to lead. You can lead when you're in an early career position. You can be a leader if you're inspiring other people to do things differently, to do more, to give more, to be more. You are a leader.

4:57 - There's no doubt as long as you are doing something that others are inspired by, you're likely some form of a leader. For me, the differentiator between being a leader and a great leader is that piece of you build other leaders.

5:11 - Yeah.

5:11 - That's the fundamental thing. And I think great leaders. It's not just about to me, there's leadership. Right. And you're a good leader. If you're telling other people a great job, you're giving them the feedback and keep going or hey, you know, tweak this part or have you considered this? I think that's good leadership, great leadership is you help people believe internally that they are great. You give them this power, if you will, over their own thinking about how they seen themselves. I think that is incredible. It's powerful. It's cool. It's all of those things. It's what I strive to be every.

5:47 - Day, helping others see what is really in them. It just makes me think back to a teacher that I had in high school that said, Kim, I just see more in you. And I think if you just applied yourself a little bit more. You could do more. And I'm thinking, what? But it's really true. Great leaders are able to see things in people help dig that out and help people see that for themselves and do something with it. Great skill of a leader.

6:15 - All right. Can I go on to my third one?

6:17 - Yeah, that's what I was going to say. So what's your number three?

6:19 - Number three is great leaders make their health a priority.

6:24 - Okay.

6:25 - So it's a little bit different. Yeah. I don't know that we emphasize this enough. I know I don't emphasize this enough in my own life. And I think great leaders, they think about their health from a physical, mental and spiritual perspective. They have balance. They wait. I was reading something this morning. Wait. Before work, there is a moment of quiet before they go to work. They have that moment of if it's meditation, if it's prayer, whatever it is, great leaders take that moment before they dig in and go to work. They find that balance. They get ready to take on the day. And from a physical perspective, in my mind, it's just a simple it's the basics. It's eating right, having some exercise. It's the day to day. Everything that you are putting and doing with your body and how that helps your brain function, how that helps you show up with your team. I think great leaders put their health first.

7:28 - That's really good. I was just kind of just reminiscing about what does that really mean? And what about leaders that are going through something where they really have a major illness? Does that mean they're not a great leader? And I'm like, no, that can't be it because there is somebody that's on my mind right now that is a great leader. And I know that they went through a terrible health issue for an extended period of time. Does that mean that their great leadership was on hold? And I'm like, no, not really, because it was their great leadership. It was all the things that they were doing before. I mean, this is an iron man that is a great leader. And he just kind of had to put that on hold while he dealt with some health issues. And now he's right back to being Mr. Iron man. But it's the things that he did before that helped carry him through that sick part of his life or through a tough part of his life. And so I absolutely think that great leaders to be at their peak, right, to be in that realm or that moment where they're hitting on all eight cylinders, they've got to have some type of focus on their health first before they can go and help someone else. I think that's cool. I have not done that right. I've not done that in my leadership for probably the past four years until Covet Hit and COVID. Has actually helped my leadership in a way that I'm able to slow down a little bit more. I'm still working many hours, but I'm getting up a lot earlier because I can have a little bit more of a routine. And so in that early moment in the morning is when I do a little Bible study and a quiet time and some meditation and even just a little bit of stretching just for me before I go and give of myself to someone else. And it has made a huge difference.

9:16 - Yeah. This is an area for me that I've got to get right. I have struggled with this for a very long time, but I do believe how you show up, how you are feeling on a you know, I appreciate the comment about the acute illness outside of those acute moments of illness, how do you show up and do you bring the energy that you need? Are you bringing the critical thinking that you need? Are you showing up and what you do day in and day out from again, that physical, mental, spiritual perspective, I think, impacts your leadership incredibly. You can show up and people go that person, they are showing up. They have brought their game and they are ready to play. Or the person who's kind of half in, half out, they're not quite focused. You can just see it on their face that it's just not there. They're not present.

10:15 - Yeah, absolutely. This brings me back to a story. Probably six years ago, maybe six or seven years ago, and I was having a lot of trouble sleeping. I mean, I had some major insomnia. And when I come into the office, I pretty much do my best to get my hair and make it all right. My shoes and everything looking good. So I'm presenting myself well, but there was a time when you actually pulled me into your office and you just wanted to talk about what was really going on with me, and you let me know that people are talking about I'm looking ragged. So you're just checking and doing some questioning about what's really going on in my life. And I'm like, well, honestly, I'm getting maybe 3 hours of sleep, good sleep at my best. And I was taking all kinds of over the counter things just to try to get some sleep. And none of that was happening. And if you would not have pulled me aside, given me some feedback, and had an honest conversation about it, I still probably would not have gone to the doctor. I would have probably just tried more and more and more things. And it was in that moment that I went to the doctor that I learned that none of the things that I was doing was going to help true insomnia. And so I could not be more thankful for that moment. But I truly believe that bringing your best just goes even down to the core of are you getting enough sleep?

11:34 - Absolutely.

11:34 - Do you get to bed soon enough. Do you spend enough time just getting the rest you need before you go and come in the next day and start to give again?

11:42 - It's just the day to day. How are we treating our bodies? How are we taking care of ourselves? And are we thinking about that and really thinking about that in relationship to our leadership? All right, so those are what my high points are. Those are my top three. What do you got? What are your top three?

11:58 - Well, I don't have three. I've got two.

12:02 - All right.

12:02 - Hopefully I'm not coming in a little short, but I really did. I thought about it. I'm going to break it down to two things that I think differentiate a good leader from a great leader. And for me, good leaders have all of those skills. You can do a Google search, you can do an Amazon search for what are the best books on leadership, and they're going to give you here's a list of ten attributes or 20 skills or whatever. I truly believe that a good leader needs all those. And a great leader has figured out when to pull out which skill, at which moment. And so for an example, you might have something that comes in, comes across your desk that day, and it is high priority and it is a short deadline, and you've got to get your people to help you get it done. Empathy and collaboration are important, but they're not important in that moment. What you need at that moment is a little bit of accountability and delegation to go help get whatever it is you need done. So great leaders have figured out what skill to pull out at what moment.

13:04 - Yeah. Thinking about the time when I pulled out a hammer and probably wasn't the right tool. Right. There was a time in my life in my leadership where I tended to use a hammer more often than was necessary or needed. And it took some time for me to figure out that was the wrong darn tool. And in leadership, I think there might be a time that you have to use the hammer, but you don't have to overuse that hammer. And that was something that took me probably gosh four or five years to figure that out. And I remember when it dawned on me, I was like, okay, wrong tool. Got to use a different one. It's hard it's hard to admit that the tool wasn't working and trying out other things. And it looks clunky because quite honestly, the hammer works for me. Right. It's very comfortable. It shouldn't be very effective. Effective on the short term.

13:59 - Yeah. So that's it. Just choosing the right tool for the right moment or the right skill for the right moment. So my number two is great leaders focus on who they are versus putting focus on what they do. For example, when I was back in my early years as a supervisor, I am really focused on am I setting my expectations? Am I delegating? Am I having my one on ones versus now in my leadership, I really try to focus on who am I? And I know that I am a leader that cares. And so as a result of caring, I have one on ones that are a little bit different. And sometimes I have a one on one where I just call one of my people and say, hey, what's going on in your world? And I don't want to talk about business. I want to talk about truly about their personal life. How are they doing? How are the kids doing? How are the tomatoes growing? Because I'd really and truly care about people. And so what I do just are the actions of who I am. And it almost just comes naturally. For example, if I want to be an organized leader, that's who I am. As a result of that, I answer all my emails in a day, I clean out my one note in a day, or I keep my organized to do list, but it's because of who I am as a leader.

15:22 - Yeah. My brain is kind of spinning here as I'm listening to you talk about this. I appreciate I like the way you've coached this from, hey, good leaders are very action oriented. They do things. They do their delegation, they have their checklist, they do their getting stuff done right. They're having their one on ones. This is for me. It's like, all right, I like this in terms of who am I as a leader? And I'm very deliberate, very purposeful in what I'm doing as a result of that. So there's some process that you go through or you have gone through to say, this is who I am as a leader. And these are the things that are important. I care. And as a result of that, I'm going to go do X, Y and Z that's directly tied back to who I am and what I believe in. Kind of your value set, right?

16:20 - Yeah.

16:21 - And that's a nugget. I like that little kind of tuck that away for myself.

16:26 - Yeah. Because I care. I send thank yous. I send appreciation notes or I make appreciation calls or things like that. In the beginning, I would say that even the do the action items were it's not that I wanted to checklist them, but I had to be very deliberate in thinking about, am I doing those now on the back end a few years in some of those things just come natural. I wouldn't even consider not doing it. And there's other things like the thank yous are being appreciative of people or showing people appreciation, making calls just to check in and say, hey, they're not a checklist item for me. They really and truly come natural for me. Now, it's easy. Yes.

17:06 - It's second nature because you've unlocked that internal inside. What are you about? What do you believe? Who are you as a leader?

17:16 - Yes.

17:16 - That is cool. That is powerful, man. I love that. And for me, I know we've got to run here just in terms of time. But for me, the next conversation and maybe we have it here on our next episode. I don't know, we can still talk about it, but is that piece of how do you unlock that? What is the process of understanding? What am I about as a leader? What is important to me and how can I lead that way? How can I be more deliberate in my leadership?

17:50 - Yeah, that'd be a good topic. I think we could break it down.

17:53 - Alright, so let's recap it because I know we got to go. Let's recap what we've come up with. You all right if I start first?

18:00 - Yeah, I'll go.

18:01 - All right. So my first one was self awareness. And again, I think we're aligned here. We might be calling it some different things and looking at it from different lenses, but self awareness, having some level of selfcontrol, knowing what your hot buttons are, knowing what you bring to the table, not pretending to be somebody else, that you're not very comfortable in your own skin, high, high levels of self awareness. My second one is great leaders create other leaders. We're all about building up other people around us, encouraging, supporting, helping others around us believe that they are awesome. And then my third one was health. They make their health, spiritual, physical, mental a priority in their life. They think about it on a daily basis. They are focused on that. They bring their A game every single day.

18:52 - I like it. Can't deny any of that. I think those are all great. And my two, I'll just wrap it up with, I believe that great leaders have the ability to choose the right skill for the right moment. They don't show up to dig a ditch with a screwdriver. They come in, they come in with the right skill at the right moment. And then they also secondly, just have a focus on who they are. They're comfortable with who they are. They know who they are and what they do is a result of who they are. And they follow through on that, right. They do those things that keeps that whatever you want to call it, reputation or attributes of that part of their leadership going.

19:38 - All right, so listen, I have thoroughly enjoyed this conversation. We don't have much time to just have these big conversations about leadership. And this is so much fun. I have enjoyed this one a lot.

19:49 - I have too. And now I'm going to go drink my green juice, my celery juice, so I can be healthy for the rest of the day and think about my leadership just a little bit more.

19:58 - That's right. I love that celery juice. Thank you, by the way, for putting me on the celery juice.

20:03 - It's good stuff.

20:04 - Yeah, it really is. And I don't necessarily start from scratch like you do. I found it already juiced for me. I look forward to that every morning. I am enjoying the celery juice.

20:14 - Awesome. Yeah. I started it with my mornings and I crave it now and now I'm drinking it in the evenings too. And this week I bought a few little different things that I'm going to juice so I'm excited to go and try that. So that's what I'm going to do this afternoon is make some new juice.

20:30 - You're going to get ready for a juice cleanse? Get after it, girl.

20:34 - No, ma'am. No cleansing.

20:38 - All right. Those of you who are listening, thank you so much for joining our conversation today. What did you think about what Kim and I just discussed? Is there anything else you would add to this conversation? We look forward to hearing from you.

20:51 - So send us your leadership questions, ideas and challenges and to connect with us.

20:55 - Go to our website at extrashotofleadership.com and come back.

20:59 - Again for an Extra Shot of Leadership.