Want to become your best self?
When you’re at your best, you can use your strengths & talents to serve others…
In a way that ignites YOU.
And there are ways to return to your best self even after a bad day…
In this episode, I’m joined by Susan Brady, co-author of Arrive & Thrive: 7 Impactful Practices for Women Navigating Leadership.
She’s here to help women (and men, too!) unlock their best selves and embrace inclusive leadership.
Listen to learn:
-
The real meaning of authenticity
-
How to create a healthy team environment
-
Your “best self” centering practice
-
How to bring your whole self to work
-
The relationship between courage and vulnerability
-
And more
Mentioned in this episode:
Transcript
Susan Brady: Fostering resilience is about learning from our setbacks and using that and stepping forward both to inspire others by our own stories, and also to create resilient cultures when the going gets rough.
Voiceover: You’re listening to the Build a Vibrant Culture podcast with professional speaker, coach and consultant Nicole Greer.
Nicole Greer: Welcome everybody to the Build a Vibrant Culture podcast. My name is Nicole Greer and they call me the vibrant coach and I am here with the author of Arrive and Thrive. Her name is Susan Brady and Susan is the Deloitte Ellen Gabriel Chair for Women and Leadership at Simmons University and the first Chief Executive Officer of The Simmons University Institute for Inclusive Leadership. I am absolutely beyond thrilled to have her here today. Susan has published two books previously on leadership and her third was co authored by Executive Chair of the Board of Deloitte US Janet Foutty, and Simmons University President Dr. Lynn Perry Wooten.
Arrive and Thrive is all about seven impactful practices for women navigating leadership. It debuted in April 2022. And of course, landed on the bestseller list in the Wall Street Journal, Publishers Weekly and USA Today. Not only does Susan sit around writing all day long and chairing all these things, she also serves as the emeritus board member of Strong Women, Strong Girls and as a Strategic Advisor for the relationship technology company. Our.Love. Susan resides in the Boston area and is the proud mom of two awesome daughters. Oh, I want to hear about them. Oh, and these too, the two rambunctious Portuguese Water Dogs. Welcome to the show, Susan.
Susan: Thanks for having me, Nicole. Really happy to be here. Thank you.
Nicole: Yeah, absolutely. Okay, so tell us about your two sweet baby girls. Let’s hear about them first, the most important thing on the whole show. Let’s hear about them.
Susan: It is the most important thing on the whole show. I agree. So Caroline MacKenty Brady is in there both turning a significant age this coming week. They’re both Labor Day babies. So funny. Yep. And she is a sophomore at a small liberal arts college in Ohio called Kenyon College, very proud of her there. And I think working her way to thriving. Abby, Abigail Parker Brady is going to be 17 next week and starting her junior year in high school and you know, living her best life. So they are my greatest teachers.
Nicole: Yeah, I bet. And it’s, it’s fun every stage of the game, right? Like when they were babies, it was fun. When when they were eight, it was fun. Now that they’re teenagers and young adult ladies. Oh my gosh, so much fun. I have a 23 year old her name’s Caitlin Greer. And she’s at the University of Lynchburg. And she is going to become a physician, excuse me, a physical therapist. And so I’m all excited about this. Because in my old age, she’ll be able to help me walk around and get my act together. So I’m very excited. Isn’t it fun when these girls grow up do amazing things.
Susan: Yes, it’s it’s it’s awesome. And it’s navigating teenage-hood is also a an act of patience, I think.
Nicole: Yeah. Well, people are always like, would you like to go back? And I’m like, no, no, thank you. I’ll stay right here where I am. I love where I am. I think it’s interesting for sure. All right, well, you are all about the girls and that is an exciting thing. Are the are the water dogs girls, or are they boy dogs?
Susan: I’ve got one one boy. We’ve got one boy and one girl, Charlie and Piper and Portuguese Water Dogs are full of energy and full of life and you know, need exercise and just all sorts of personality. They keep, they actually keep me on my toes.
Nicole: Because you have to go for walks you know. And that’s, that’s good. When you get a dog, it’s almost like a built in, you know, physical get your 10,000 steps in a day things. So that’s good, right? Absolutely. Well, I’m delighted to have you on the show. And boy, the word inclusive is hot out there. Everybody’s talking about DEI, diversity, equity and inclusion. And I’ve got myself an expert. So first of all, I’d like to hear from you. What’s your definition of leadership, number one. And then would you add to it the piece about being inclusive? Will you clue us in let us know what all this means?
Susan: Well, I have to confess I think leadership and inclusive leadership, it’s a little bit of an oxymoron. So in order, yeah. So leadership, simply put, I think, is is creating an environment where people want to join you on a mission to manifest something that doesn’t yet exist. And it’s very much a choice. And in order to do that, I think the most effective leaders you know, need to make space where everyone can bring their unique self and feel of value and feel belonging and so, the act of creating inclusion in enables effective leadership. Do you see that?
Nicole: I love what you’re talking about. I couldn’t poke a hole in it if I tried to. So what I heard you say was that the part about being inclusive is almost like kind of the recipe for getting the folks behind you to actually get in lockstep with you. That’s kind of what I heard. Did I get it right?
Susan: Yeah. I mean, I think we haven’t had the consciousness to notice some people because of our identity. And we just haven’t noticed. So I don’t I don’t see it as a willful, you know, overlooking of others. I think nowadays, leaders need to be consciously seeking out different voices, different, different different identities, people who might have different points of view, and really valuing what they see, and asking everybody to come in. And then we start to get things like, discretionary effort. And you know, we start to have fun with each other at work. And we start to, you know, manifest great things, because people feel like they’re valued.
Nicole: Yeah, absolutely. And so I got to just poke on a word phrase, you said, you said discretionary effort. And that is where great companies come alive, great things start to happen is when people give you more than the 100%. You know how people say, I give 110%. Well, that 10% is the discretionary percent. So I think that’s fantastic. And I think there are a lot of people who wouldn’t be willing to do that, if they were heard, seen and recognized inside organizations. So I couldn’t agree with you more. That’s fantastic. All right.
So I wanted to spend our time together talking about the new book, because first of all, we want to make sure that the ladies that are out there in our organizations are doing well. And so you’ve written a book entirely for them called Arrive and Thrive: 7 Impactful Practices for Women Navigating Leadership. So would it be good if we jumped into that? I see it’s over your shoulder there in the background. Are you so happy about your new book?
Susan: I am, you know, I am. I’m very grateful to have had the opportunity to co create this project, which is sort of turning into a movement, the arrive and thrive movement. Your listeners can find out more about arrive and thrive on arriveandthrive.com. Look, the seven practices, Nicole, they’re really for everyone. The context, though, is that too often our work cultures, encourage women to get our foot in the door only to leave us without the support once once we really step in. And so we wrote Arrive and Thrive to change that, because we know when women are empowered to lead they aren’t the only ones to benefit.
Nicole: Yeah, absolutely. So what she just said is you fellas that are listening, don’t turn it off. Listen, these are for you, too.
Susan: That’s totally what I meant to say just now is don’t rule this out. Because it’s just for women. Women, listen up hard. Men, listen up harder.
Nicole: Love it. Okay. Well, in the book, like the title says there are seven practices. And I think all of these are fantastic. So let’s see if we can hit them all. The first one is practice number one, investing in your best self. Lead from the best part of yourself and ensure you tend to your mind, body and spirit for continual renewal. Oh, all right. So every, you’re, right, everybody needs this. So listen up people.
Susan: Yeah. So the way we define best self is where your strengths and talents come together with where you’re called to add value to others, which comes together with what ignites joy and vitality in you. And then your, the surround of these things, is your well being practices. And when we’ve got all that going on, you know, we’ve got a good chance of thriving. And so the idea is that this can be sometimes effortless, you know, it’s where we lose track of time and think, oh, my gosh, I was just really, really in my zone, in my jam. And then it doesn’t feel great when we when we’re not in our best self. So the more we know our best self, the harder it is when we’re not there. And so this practice is about really fully understanding you at your best, and then learning a practice to return to you at your best.
Nicole: All right, well, I’m curious, how do you return to your best? What is the practice for that? Can you tell it to us?
Susan: Yeah, sure, sure. Well, the first step of the practice is noticing when you’re not there, right. And oftentimes it happens first in our own mind, because what we think and feel drives what we say and do. And so it’s likely going to appear in some sort of maybe harsh words or feeling that’s uncomfortable either annoyance, overwhelm, fatigue, anger, frustration, you know, that. Not great, we don’t feel we don’t feel so great. And so noticing is first and the second is sort of taking a look at and taking a pause about you know why? And then the return to the best self is a combination of getting curious with yourself and others and also compassionate with yourself and others.
So it’s really a return to a place where I bring my best, you bring your best. Typically we lose ourselves, not because of something that we necessarily asked for, but because we find something we find ourselves contending with. Like a dead, hard deadline on a project or a difficult person who said something that rubbed us the wrong way. Or, you know, maybe we weren’t able to get a good night’s sleep, right? So the first step is really about consciousness. It’s about being aware, so that we don’t say and do things that we regret. So the return is first and foremost about awareness. And then we offer a practice in the book called the self, the best self centering practice. Awareness is the first step of that practice.
Nicole: I love it. I love it. Yeah. And then you said, when you were talking about the return, you said, you’ll know, because there’s kind of this inner critic talking to you. And I know, don’t you have another book on the inner critic?
Susan: Yeah. So funny. Yeah, this is sort of the next generation of certainly my experience and thinking and research on the inner critic and how it shows up. I think it robs us of our best self, right. And so you have an inner critic, I have an inner critic.
Nicole: I think the whole world has an inner critic. I mean, if you don’t, you could make a million. I don’t know how you figured that one out.
Susan: So it’s so true. Right? My joke with with men is, you know, we all have inner critics, men and women alike, every identity. I just think women need to talk about it more, we need to talk about ours. And then, you know, going back to the purpose of why arrive and thrive is actually sort of packaged for women, the context for us is more complicated. And I think, you know, that creates a lot more opportunity to be like, we’re not quite getting it right. It also creates opportunity for us to feel like we’re working really hard here. Why can’t the other people pull their weight? Or why is he still talking? Or why didn’t she do what she was supposed to do? Right? Because so the critic has fair play at ourselves and others, but it it definitely, I think is primarily, primary derailer to leading our life from our best self.
Nicole: Yeah, absolutely. And so just to reiterate what she was saying about the best self, it’s where our talents, the place we’re asked to contribute, and where joy and vitality hang out. And our wellness is circled around that. So I’ve got that whole thing, locked and loaded in a little visual in my brain, I hope you all pick it up. Alright, so number one is that we’ve got to work on our well being and get in touch with who we are at our best self. I know when we’re derailed. I don’t know if you’ve ever heard this one before Susan. But I was taught this, I don’t know where I was taught this. It’s like been rolling around in my pocket for years.
But somebody said, If you’re hungry, you’re angry, you’re lonely or you’re tired, which were kind of the words you were using. When we’re not at our best self, you need to halt. And so I think that’s what she said about pause, figure it out, get yourself back. So you definitely need chapter one, at least folks so that you can get yourself in your best self place. All right. So we’re, let’s say, we’ve figured out who our best self is, we’ve learned some practices to return to our best self. Now practice number two is embracing our authenticity, bringing our whole self to work with intention, and ease, I really like the word ease on the back end there. So that means like, no anxiety, no issues, just bring it. So tell us all about embracing authenticity.
Susan: Right. So I think, you know, the notion that your competitive advantage is you, right. What makes you you. What makes you unique, what makes you have the particular skills and talents that others value and that you value and that bring you joy is actually really special. And so we don’t want you to feel like you can’t be you. The other part of this practice is I think there’s a growing intolerance to inauthenticity at work and of certainly inauthenticity among leadership. So we want to be greeted by our leaders as humans, and we want to be seen as human beings. And so, to do this, we need to double down on on being honest with ourselves and others. Being transparent.
I just, when I use the word transparent, I get a little bit cautious because I know some people work in contexts where it’s not safe for them to be fully transparent, or it’s not appropriate. And so there’s a lot of judiciousness that needs to go along with how we show up authentically at work. That doesn’t mean I can be unabashedly myself in any environment and think that that’s going to be you know, contextually okay. So it’s really kind of grounding ourselves in our genuine selves, and showing up in a way that feels right for the context that we’re in.
Nicole: Yeah, and that best self part too, right, you know? So, you know, I’ve been around people who have who have said, well, you know, I’m just blunt. That’s the way I am. So like, no, that’s still not okay. You can’t be, that’s not your authentic self.
Susan: So glad you mentioned that. One of the one of the things I’ve been a little bit allergic to on the whole, you know, authenticity movement is, I agree with you. I think sometimes people use it as a rationale for behaving in ways that, frankly, aren’t really great, you know, right. I don’t think that’s authenticity. I think that’s defending behavior that is potentially harmful to others. So we go through a little bit of that. The only thing that was interesting about the research we did for this chapter is, you know, authenticity, I guess I thought, like, not that we’re we’d stopped growing, but I did think something about our authentic self is sort of a fixed state like we are, we are who we are. And if you met me in high school, and if you met me, you know, 10 years later, and now you might think, you know, Susan, is Susan is.
While, I think some of that is true. I also think we grow and change and our values grow and change. In the authenticity chapter, we offer a values exercise, and to think that as we mature, and as our context of our life, as our children, as our girls grow older and go to school, and then launch independently, as you know. We have pets or not, as we work full time or for ourselves or others or not. Our own values are how we think about what is authentically most important to us will morph as well. Right? So staying in touch with I think, and paying attention to that, for ourselves and for others is a really important work.
Nicole: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, one of the things I do in my coaching practices, I will talk to people about like points of light. Like, if you go, you know, start as soon as you can have a memory until today, you know, what, what were the little like, aha moments or little bright spots in your journey. And I think that’s where you picked up on who your authentic self is. You know, like, in my own life, Nicole Greer, first of all, is a learner. I mean, like, learning is my thing. I’m guessing you’re a learner, too, since you hang out at the university, and you do all this research. And I think that, you know, if you just thought about, you know, what are the things that you’ve always done, always loved. I don’t know about you.
But I would like line up the Barbies and then my brother’s GI Joes and the teddy bears and and then I would teach them, and then I would go learn some more than I teach some more so then teachers part of my thing. So I think it’s just figuring out all of those things, is really important. And I want to repeat a quote, she said, because you all need to write it down. Stop the treadmill, pull the car over. She said, your competitive advantage is you, as long as you know what that competitive advantage is. Right. So again, going back to your best self, I love it.
Susan: Yeah, I credit that part of that quote to one of the thrivers, we feature in the book, Carla Harris, who has written several books, her latest is Lead to Win. And I think the most important thing is taking it upon yourself to really understand who you are, is the ticket to how to lead and arrive and thrive in a way that feels you know, that emphasizes your vitality. That contributes to your, to your livelihood, which leads us to practice three.
Nicole: Okay, right. Right. So to be yourself, right? Well, because I think too, you know, as we’re coming up, you know, again, that part where you said like, as you as you get older, as you mature, as you go through things, you’re gonna change and you’re gonna grow. Well, at first we’re like, how do we do this, and we look to somebody else to emulate. But then at some point, you know, you’re picking up tips from different leaders around you, or tips of what not to do from leaders around you. And then you’re like, when I become a leader, this is what I’m gonna do. Right? So I think we learned all the way through our little leadership journey. But then this cultivating courage, I love. You say that means to commit to action, alongside acknowledging and overcoming your fear of doing so. Ah, all right, talk about courage. So huge.
Susan: I think, first of all, courage isn’t the absence of fear. It’s the presence of vulnerability. And if we don’t take risks, we oftentimes don’t manifest our full potential. And so risk taking takes courage and risk taking can be interpersonal, it can be speaking from the heart. It can be big actions, like jumping into a new job or, you know, a promotion at work. And I think the research you know, sort of did not hold that women are less courageous than men. We are more calculating in our risk taking. That’s what we found. And I think that we can borrow courage. We can borrow confidence when we’re doing something that scares us.
The other thing that I love, which is I’d say it’s one of the mainstays for the entire book is we’re just not meant to go it alone. Nicole, you know this you’ve coached people for a long time. And I, I think those leaders who really look to others to help round out what they can’t see are the ones that really rise to the top. You know, there’s no reason why we should know how to do something we’ve never done. So it will feel scary ish if you haven’t done it. So, you know, it’s it’s this practice of feeling a little vulnerable, and knowing it’s gonna be okay. And leaning on others along the way.
Nicole: Yeah, absolutely. Getting your social network in there to help you. What was the gal who’s the COO at Facebook? Sheryl Sandberg?
Susan: Oh, at Facebook. Sheryl Sandberg.
Nicole: Okay, so there’s a story I read, I just read, you know, like, you’re probably like me, because we’re both learners, everybody. So I just, I just read this article about, I was reading about HR stuff, and I’m scanning things. And then there’s this thing about a story about Sheryl Sandberg. And she was talking to the HR director at Facebook, and she was going to be offered this bigger, better opportunity. And she turned to Sheryl. And she said, I don’t know, I don’t think I’m qualified. And then she’d already been offered the position.
And Sheryl looked at her and said, you’ve been offered the position, just take it. You know, like, there wouldn’t be, and she said in the article, there wouldn’t be a man on the planet that just wouldn’t take it. Because the fact that you were offered it is the permission to take it, you know what I mean? But like you said, women are more like, well, I’m not sure. Should I do it? And so she took it, and she was very successful. So that’s, that’s just bubbling up inside of me.
Susan: For your, for your listening audience, women and women who are listening or watching. If you haven’t done something, there’s no reason you should know how to do it. It does not mean you won’t figure it out, just like you’ve figured out how to do everything until this point. So we do have to remind ourselves, oh, okay, I just yeah, I haven’t done this particular thing. But I, I can do it, and I’ll win at it. Right. So it’s this, that’s where some sort of the replacement narrative comes into best self like, okay, I got this. I got this.
Nicole: That’s right. That’s right. I mean, like, who could learn to, you know, raise two children and two Portuguese Water Dogs without just trying? So there you go. All right. So the next thing we want is.
Susan: And I’m not perfect at any of it? I just have to work on it.
Nicole: I don’t know any perfect women, or men for that point. Okay. All right. The next thing is, so we’ve cultivated courage, we’re stepping out, we’re taking risks, we’re still being calculating, but we’re like getting on with it. And we want to do this thing where we foster resilience, because we realize things could get messy, we could fall down. So you say that fostering resilience is keep up with the pace and intensity while overcoming setbacks and emerging stronger than before. Share with us a little bit about practice number four.
Susan: Well, I think I’ve said this before a lot. If you woke up woman, you know, resilience. If you woke up a woman of color, you know, resilience. If you woke up and have any identity that is not reflected in the majority who are in power in your organization, or the world for that matter, you know, resilience. So at first I, you know, when when Janet and Lynn and I were talking about the topic of resilience, I thought really? Do we have to talk about resilience? I just feel like everyone knows resilience. And what I realized is just how little we really do know resilience. That it’s just not talked about that much.
And the thing that I learned is when we have a setback, we don’t arrive at the place that we left from before. We are catapulted further forward into a wiser, more knowing self. The requirement though, of fostering resilience is doing what you do so naturally, and know and love, and that is to learn from our setbacks. And I loved Lynn, my co author, calls it reflective sensemaking. And I’ve long since thought and a mentor of mine has said, you know, reflection might be the least discussed most valuable leadership skill of all time.
Nicole: I agree.
Susan: It’s a practice, right. So fostering resilience is about learning from our setbacks. And using that and stepping forward, both to inspire others, by our own stories, to double down in believing ourselves. We can call on our resilience stories for courage when we need to practice risk taking, and also to create resilient cultures when the going gets rough and resilient organizations. So I personally just have to share like I learned a lot diving into this particular practice and writing about it.
Nicole: Yeah, absolutely. And I couldn’t agree more about being reflective. One of the things that I’ll assign a lot of times to my clients is I want you to you know, make notes about your day. I want you to keep track of things that happen during the day, during the week. So that we can we can talk about them when we come back together. Because you can’t walk into this coaching session with nothing to talk about, you know, like, I’ve had a good week. Well, I bet you there’s been ups and downs all week long. And so the only way we can make your leadership stronger is we, if we look at why did were the ups up and why were the downs down. So I think, you know, you tell somebody, I need you to journal and they flip out. But you know, really, that is what reflective is. And then I love what your, tell me, tell me your co authors name that said this. Reflective sensemaking. Who was it?
Susan: Dr. Lynn Perry Wooten writes about reflective sensemaking, and it’s highlighted in the chapter on fostering resilience. You know, just to say, I love that you ask your clients to do that. The best coaching question I ever I ever got, I learned from the godfather of leadership, Warren Bennis, when I was much younger, and he would.
Nicole: Stop. You you hung out with Warren Bennis?
Susan: I had the I had the joy and the honor of working with with Warren Bennis on a global institute for leadership development for several years. And yeah, it was pretty cool. He was the chair of the Institute, and I was the program director, and for a couple years anyway. And anyway, his question he would ask people is, and he asked it of me, is, so what’s become clear to you since last time we met? And I love the question, because it does highlight okay, what what have I become clear about? And in order to answer it, it required reflection. It required me to sort of notice what’s going on. Anyway, I just had to share that.
Nicole: And so I’m such a nerd. Because like, you know, Warren Bennis is like, I don’t know Mick Jagger.
Susan: Yeah, he is a rock star in the field of leadership. His book on becoming a leader, you know, changed my whole life. Well, we don’t have to go there. But it created, I’ve been a student and teacher of leadership for a very long time. And he was a formidable leader, and I’m honored to have met him in his lifetime because he. Warren can be known for those people who don’t know are listening. He’s, I credit Warren with being a thought leader who invited leaders to do a pretty internal journey, an introspective journey to look within in order to ignite without. And coming from a white male at the time, who had lofty leadership positions. He got through and I think he started a path of more conscious leadership. So I’m grateful to him for that.
Nicole: Yeah, I couldn’t agree more. So here’s what we need to do everybody. Everybody zip over to the Amazon and get a Warren Bennis book, but don’t forget to get Susan’s book. All right. All right, we got to have two in the cart, everybody. All right. So I love that. Okay. And so So what’s become clear since the last time we met? All right, I’m putting it in my pocket, and I’m taking it to the coaching sessions. You’re amazing in my life. All right. And I just want to say one thing about resilience is that I think that resilience i like this thing called willingness, like, you know, it’s like, you know, getting a hold of your inner will and bringing it back to the table.
But once you get your will engaged, then it’s just simply like, being open, being creative thinking about the future. I mean, you know what, let’s go again. It’s a do over. So I don’t know about you, but I love do overs on the on the playground at school in elementary school. All right, practice number five is inspiring a bold vision. So enroll others in a mission that awakens their spirit. Okay, so I think that’s what Warren Bennis was doing. Because look, look how we’re like, just gaga over this guy. He got our spirits engaged, and desire to create a future that does not yet exist.
You know, Susan, I’ve said this on my podcast many times, my dad used to say the world’s going to hell in a handbasket. And so I heard that a lot growing up. So I kind of was like, I’m not going to think like that, because I heard it all the time that the world was terrible. But really, the only reason we don’t have a great world is because nobody’s thought up the new one and is getting after it. So let’s get after a new a new world, a more beautiful future. How do we do that? How do we get a bold vision?
Susan: You know, this was a it was really fun to create this chapter with my co authors. We brought, the three of us brought a lot of ideas to the table, and then we interviewed some cool people. And here’s the essence of what we learned. And there’s some some interesting practices and some studies cited in the chapter is I think, when people think of vision, Nicole, it’s like, you know, you’re sitting alone and like, you know, the skies part and you know, lightning strikes and all of a sudden poof, you have this beautiful vision and then you march out and you manifest it.
Truth be told, vision comes from a lot of lot of conversations. And if in the organizational context for leaders to engage a bold vision, I wouldn’t want anyone to think they’re not a visionary because they personally don’t have the idea. And the best place to start is noticing, and asking what’s working? And what’s not working? What’s working around here, process people systems, you name it. What’s not working? Do you have any ideas about what would make it better? What could be more efficient? What could be easier?
You find leaders who are asking these kinds of questions, you’re finding an invitation to come and give some, you know, input. A vision can manifest from that, you know. And we talk about this in great length in the chapter. How, you know, a vision is a collaborative effort. It’s not a singular sort of luck. There certainly are visionaries like that. But in terms of inspiring a bold vision, the first step is involve other people in the actual vision itself, and inspiring around it is to involve them in the actual communication of it. So it’s, it’s not a singular act.
Nicole: No. And we know this, and everybody listening knows this, that like, remember, when you were younger? You know, we’ve evolved, we’ve grown, but even when people on the frontline of our organizations are sitting there going, why don’t they do this? Why don’t they do that? What is going on here? If they only knew, you know. So I think that, you know, a lot of times your frontline employees are the ones that know exactly where some changes need to be made. That could turn, turn things into a whole new future.
So I love what you’re saying about, we have to notice, notice, notice and evolve and get other people to help us communicate the vision. Love it. Fantastic. All right. So practice number six is creating a healthy team environment. Okay, this is a big one. We’re all doing team building. Why don’t things get better? Please tell us the answer. So her definition here is personify your organization’s values, which means walk the talk, and walk the walk and all that, and standards while creating an environment that is supportive, collaborative, and healthy.
Susan: You know, there is so much research on teaming, there are so many books on teaming, there are many experts on teamwork and leading teams and managing teams and effective teams. You know, this particular chapter, I loved collaborating on this, because it’s the only chapter where we decided to come up with our own rubric. And what I mean by that, because there’s so much information and research and practice of team leadership, we just looked for a distillation of what matters most. And we came up with six actions. The last one I’ll speak about here, which is psychological safety. And, you know, the, it’s been made very popular by Amy Edmondson’s work.
And what we found was without psychological safety, the other five actions don’t really matter. You know, one of them is, you know, identifying the strengths of the individual members of the team. Another is spending time and cultivating a learning group mindset like you are, you know, learning from each other and having connection points of learning. Another whole action is around communication. All of these we know. What, what was interesting is that they really don’t matter. If you don’t have the psychological safety to say what you really think, without feeling like you’re going to be penalized either implicitly or explicitly.
And so the chapter goes through the six actions and brings home just how much leadership is a business of people. It’s a social construct, it’s a relationship. And so is healthy team leadership. It’s a relationship. It’s just plurality, right? It’s, so I need to I my bias towards action. And so when it comes to team leadership, sometimes on mass, I tend to want to get the job done. I need to slow it down and see the human beings just like I would want on one, right. So anyway, I love it because it’s a distillation. It’s a chapter of distillation. So I hope folks enjoy it.
Nicole: Yeah, I think they will. And so I had to read Amy’s book, when I got my master’s degree. It’s just called Teaming, right. Do I have my story straight? And what a great read first of all, so now you have three books in the cart. Everybody. Don’t forget you have three books in the cart. Warren Bennis, Amy Edmondson and then, of course, this book, Arrive and Thrive. You’re gonna have those in the cart. Put them on the bedside table. Let’s go people. All right. So psychological safety. Can you tell us a little bit about how we create that? Did you guys see some evidence in your research that said, here are the things you need to do?
Susan: We didn’t do original research on psychological on psychological safety. It does connect to the seventh and final practice of the book which is creating a culture of inclusion And, you know, it goes back to where we started, Nicole about your your question of me about what is inclusion? And what’s what’s my definition of leadership? And you know, I think a check on psychological safety is are the people around me in my team, in my environment in my workplace, are they bringing their unique selves to work? Does it feel like they’re bringing themselves? And are they being accepted for who they are? Are they able to connect with others in a way that honors their value? That’s a little bit of the recipe of what it means to create inclusion as well.
But I was inspired and have been inspired. I don’t know if you saw this, that Google did a study a while back called Project Aristotle. And Project Aristotle was, we referenced this in the book, was a study about why some teams were high performing at Google and some teams weren’t. And what they thought they’d see is all sorts of predictive, you know, less soft realities. Like maybe business decisions were made more quickly, or problem solving as tackled in a particular way. And it turns out that what they found was, there was there was safety.
So and in this particular instance, it was team members were able to disagree with each other and be respectful at the same time. There was not fear, people could be vulnerable, you know, they could sort of really put out there what was possible and feel like it was going to be okay, to try new things out and take risks. So, hopefully, that fills in a little bit of color around safety. And, and without it, we can’t have inclusive cultures either, right? Because we’re asking people to come in and bring themselves in. And we know the output of our work is better when we have more inclusion. But anyway, I just rambled on about that.
Nicole: I was taking notes. There was no rambling. Tt was just like downloading genius. Okay, so everybody go check out Project Aristotle. I’m sure the Google has lots of stuff on it. So Google that up. And I love what you said about, you know, it, you know, you have psychological safety. So here’s the thing is, you know, on your team that you’re on, or the teams that you’re on, can you disagree and still be respectful? And is there a, you know, a lack of fear, you don’t feel like you’re going to be, it’s going to be held against you? Right? Anything that you say. So, we have a researcher over at University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, Roger Schwarz.
I don’t know if you’re familiar with his work. But there’s another book, oh, my gosh, four in the cart people. All right. So this one is Smarter Leaders, Smarter Teams. One of the little goodies in his book that I have picked up and put in my pocket, is he says, you’ve got to learn to discuss the undiscussables. I just think that’s the greatest little line right there. What do you think about Roger’s line? Is that what you’re saying when you say inclusive and all that?
Susan: That’s true. That’s true at work. And it’s true in relationships anywhere you are. And it’s hard. Oh my gosh, learning how to discuss the undiscussables, it’s hard, it makes y’all uncomfortable. And, you know, there’s all sorts of risk involved. So learning how to do that skillfully is super important. I just have to feed back to you, Nicole. I love how you active listen and recapture the thinking of your guests. I listened to a couple of your other podcasts and you do this so well.
Nicole: Well, thank you. Well, you know, I know people I mean, well, I just know my own listening habits. There’s so much information out there. And and if you’re a, you know, learner, like me, I listen to a bunch of mess all the time. And I love it. I can’t get enough of it. But I know I’m in and out. Like sometimes I have to rewind or figure out where I was. And so I try to repeat so people don’t really miss the things that I believe was just a little bit of genius that was laid down. So you’ve been laying down genius, left and right.
I think I took I took four pages of notes for our time together. So I am so grateful to you, Susan Brady, for you coming on the Build a Vibrant Culture podcast. But here’s what I know. There’s one gal out there, one woman who’s like, wait, don’t let her go. One more nugget from Susan. So do you have one more little nugget of genius that you would kind of like tie a bow on this thing and tell us about that do you think would be a goodie that we could stick in our pocket?
Susan: Well, how about this? I’ll I’ll end with you the way I ended my time on I was interviewed by Good Morning America with my last book and they asked me I you know. Whenever I’m interviewed, it’s like, what’s the one thing. And I was, I was compelled to say and I want to say it here now for whatever reason is you are more powerful than you think. And so much of what I find is people are waiting to be anointed with either a gift or skill or the worthiness of promotion or whatever permission to have the life they want. And what I want to say is like we get to do that right now, you know. We can decide that it’s time to thrive right now and figure out how to go about manifesting that. So you are more powerful than you think. And I would love to keep talking. I’d love it if some of your listeners reached out and join me on LinkedIn or wherever they choose to follow. And thank you so much for having me.
Nicole: Yeah, it’s been great to be with you. And so listen, you can find Susan at inclusiveleadership.com/team/Susan-Brady. That was a mouthful. It’ll be in the show notes, everybody. So you can go there. And then on your LinkedIn, we just look for Susan Brady and the Institute for Inclusive Leadership. She’ll pop right up. Link in with her there. And we’re absolutely delighted to have you and I look forward to hearing about what like your would be your sixth book that comes out? Let us know so we can have you come back and we’ll do another podcast. You can download some more genius and listen, ladies, get out there, get busy. You’re more powerful than you think. Thank you, Susan Brady.
Susan: Thanks, Nicole.
Voiceover: Ready to build your vibrant culture? Bring Nicole Greer to speak to your leadership team, conference or organization to help them with her strategies, systems and smarts to increase clarity, accountability, energy and results. Your organization will get lit from within. Email Nicole@nicolegreer.com. And be sure to check out Nicole’s TEDx talk at nicolegreer.com.
