How can you improve vitality in the workplace?
My guest, David Lindsay, is an Australian coach, trainer, and athlete. David has developed a unique approach to improving vitality in the workplace, empowering teams to boost morale, productivity, and profitability. His keynote speeches are filled with tools and strategies to overcome workplace stress and burnout while promoting employee wellness.
During our conversation, David shared:
- The five steps to improve vitality in the workplace: snap, nap, tap, clap and recap
- The importance of power, passion, and purpose in achieving vitality
- The interconnectedness of power, passion, and purpose
- The six energies that contribute to overall power: intellectual, emotional, physical, social, and financial energy
- The importance of resilience and overcoming obstacles
If you’re interested in boosting vitality in your workplace, this episode is a must-listen.
Summary:
In this engaging episode of the “Build a Vibrant Culture Podcast,” I had the pleasure of sitting down with David Lindsay, a renowned coach, trainer, and accomplished athlete. Together, we dive into the core of workplace vitality as David unveils his five transformative steps. He sheds light on the profound significance of leadership as a coaching role rather than a dictatorial one. Throughout our conversation, we explore the power of establishing routines and rituals to kickstart your day with vigor. David delves into the incredible benefits of napping to unlock peak performance, the art of perpetual growth, the value of celebrating milestones, and the practice of gratitude. And, of course, I chime in with my own insights and personal experiences making this episode a well-rounded exploration of building a vibrant workplace culture.
Leadership: A Coach, Not a Dictator
During our conversation, David shared his viewpoint on leadership. He sees it as being more like a coach than a dictator. He believes in being accessible to his team, giving constructive feedback, and getting everyone on the same page to work towards a common goal.
Five Steps to Improve Vitality
David then shared his five steps to improve vitality in the workplace.
- Snapping into action: David emphasizes the importance of using tools like music and power posture to energize oneself and get into the right mindset for work. He suggests doing the same routine every day to prime the mind and body for action.
- Napping for peak performance: David encourages taking breaks, whether it’s a physical nap or a guided meditation, to relax the mind and body and shut out distractions.
- Tapping into continuous improvement: David discusses the importance of learning from mistakes. He compares it to his experience in sports where he would analyze his performance with his coach to prevent future mistakes. He emphasizes the need for businesses to constantly evolve and not remain stagnant.
- Clapping or celebrating achievements: David introduces the concept of clapping which is about creating a positive work environment. He highlights the importance of recognizing and appreciating the efforts of individuals and teams. He mentions that public recognition from management can elevate the team’s morale and create a sense of unity.
- Recap or continuous improvement: David explains how in sports they would review and analyze their performance after every fight involving everyone in the process.
Power, Passion, and Purpose
David and I also discussed the importance of power, passion, and purpose in achieving vitality. David shared his personal experience of becoming a certified yoga instructor as a stress reliever and encourages listeners to find their own passion and stress-relieving activities such as line dancing or any form of movement.
The Three P’s and Six Energies
We then discussed the three P’s – power, passion, and purpose – and how they are interconnected. David explains that when you feel passionate about something your whole body gets involved. When you combine passion and purpose, it brings power. He emphasizes the importance of not just going through the motions, but truly immersing oneself in activities and movements that raise vitality.
I mentioned the six energies I see in my coaching clients – intellectual, emotional, physical, social, and financial energy – and how they contribute to overall power. I also highlighted the importance of resilience which David has developed through his experiences as an arm wrestling athlete and overcoming obstacles in his life.
Resilience and Continuous Learning
David shared his journey in arm wrestling and how a broken arm led him to reassess his life and ultimately find his path in speaking and coaching. He emphasizes the importance of resilience and the skills he learned from his experiences.
Mentioned in this episode:
- Email David at david@davidlindsay.com.au
- David Lindsay on LinkedIn
Transcript
David Lindsay: Mistakes happen. If you don’t make mistakes, you’re not trying hard enough, so be aware that they are going to happen and it’s a great thing. So long as we task, we fail fast, we fail forward, we tap and evolve.
Voiceover: You’re listening to the Build a Vibrant Culture podcast with professional speaker, coach and consultant Nicole Greer.
Nicole Greer: Okay, Fantastic. Yeah. So tapping is this idea of really stopping to reflect. And that’s also been proven in research that one of the number one skills and habits that you can put in place for a leader is to stop and reflect. I adore that. Okay. So it’s not letting go. It’s not quitting. It’s just calming down and taking assessment of what’s actually going on. All right. So, step one is, you know, get up, snap into action, use the stuff that’s on your phone, get some apps in place, listen to music, stand up. And I did want to say something about that. So, keep up with us, listeners. I want to go back to the first one. One of the things that I’ve done is I bought a Sonny treadmill, put it underneath my desk and got the stand up desk thing. I’m standing up during our podcast as well and I stand up a lot during conference calls. I just wanted to reinforce what you said that standing is huge. One time I heard that standing sitting is the new smoking.
David: Yes, that is 100%. Yes. Yeah.
Nicole: Yeah. Okay. So I just wanted to reinforce what he said. Step two was napping. Don’t miss that. If you write that down, you get to take a nap today. The third one is tapping. All right. So lead us into number four. What is the fourth strategy or step to improve vitality?
David: Yeah, it’s clapping. It’s celebrated because in sports, you know, the champion team will be the team of champions. The workforce is very much like a sports team. And I’ll use that analogy because everyone can understand it, whether you’re an armchair athlete or real athlete, we all know what it’s about. So it’s creating that, that family unit. We spend so much time at work, but yet there’s people that turn up and they go, don’t want to work with such and such. I don’t want to work with this person. And they’re just dragging their feet, which if you’re in the environment where you’re part of a team, you want to be there and celebrating each other really brings people together. And also from top down, when management goes, man, I love what Nicole’s doing. I love what this person is doing, love what that team is doing. What it does is it elevates that team and they feel good. Public recognition goes such a long way, yet we don’t use it often enough in sports. We do it all the time at training in the game we celebrate. We’re constantly high fiving, but, you know, good work results from excellent effort. And it’s not just with the good things like in rugby league. That’s what I used to play. I played for lower grades in South Sydney. If I drop the ball and hand the ball over, my mates don’t come in and lay the boot in. Now they still pick me up, they dust me off. They said, Don’t worry about it, David, let’s raise together as a team for one set. Let’s race together and make up for it together because we score as a team and we win as a team. Well, we do also lose as a team, so it’s about building everyone together for that one, for that one end goal. So it’s constantly striving and making a place of work where you want to come in, where you’re excited to turn up and excited to be part of it.
Nicole: Mm. That’s fantastic. And, David, you have to forgive me, but I just figured out what you’re doing here. So snapping is the first thing. Napping is the second thing. Tapping is the third thing. Clapping is the fourth thing. Don’t miss that, everybody. Maybe you were there. Listeners. I’m sorry. All right, I love this. Okay. So clapping and I couldn’t agree more about celebrating because, when you celebrate, it’s another way of saying practicing gratitude. And, you know, I don’t think people often see that together. And hey, listeners, by the way, this is being recorded on my birthday. And so I’m all about celebrating, right? I mean, I’m expecting major presents. I’m just kidding. I’m too old to get a lot of presents. But if you want to send me a present, you know, go to my website. I’ll send you my address. But anyway, you know, but here’s the thing. The thing is that, you know, when we celebrate something, we are grateful for it. Like we’re grateful we graduated from school. We’re grateful we did well in our report card. We’re grateful we did well at work. And so we are just grateful that we got to have this experience. So definitely celebrating is huge. I adore that. Okay. All right. Lay it on me. What’s number five? Don’t miss this show going through the five steps.
David: Yeah, sorry. Before we jump across to that, Nicole, happy birthday all the way from Sydney, Australia So there we go. So you’re getting presents from all around the world.
Nicole: That’s right. Oh, my gosh. 57 and going strong. No sign of stopping. That’s what’s happening over here. Okay. Very good. All right, so lay it on me. We’re talking about everybody. The five steps to improving vitality. We’ve had snapping, napping- that’s my favorite so far. Tapping, clapping. And what’s the fifth one?
David: Is recap, which is all about continuous improvement. Yeah. Recap. So you say it all the time in sports after every fight, like when I was coaching, I can sit down on the sideline, take down what works, what doesn’t work, and then watch it a second time with all the different coaches because we see things slightly differently. We compile those notes, then we watch it a third time, this time with the players and what that does, that opens communication, not just top to bottom, but more importantly, bottom to top. That’s where the players get their say. So, as a coach, I want problems. I need problems, but we also need solutions to go along with that. And as I said before, if I’m the same person in six months as I am today, that’s a waste of six months. If my speaking is the same in six months, that’s a waste of six months. My business. If that’s the same, that’s a waste of six months because it’s all about this. It’s constantly working to get that 1% better each and every day. How we do that is, yes, we celebrate what works, but then we find out what doesn’t work and we find out from the ground up and then we work on solutions to that. Recap is all about continuous, never ending improvement in every element of life.
Nicole: Mmm. That’s fantastic. So again, everybody, it’s snapping, it’s napping, it’s tapping, it’s clapping, and it’s recapping. So those are the five steps to improve vitality, like in your own life. These are totally applicable to one person and then of course applicable to a team, to an organization. Totally able to use this in all the different places. Now one of the things that I think is so great about you is that you have some passion around stress management and some people are listening to this and they are thinking, what is David on? Well, I’m just going to tell you, he’s not drugged right now because we did a blood test prior to the show. I’m just kidding. We didn’t do that. But what I would like to know is, would you be able to download, other than these five steps, maybe some things that you’ve done to help people reduce their stress?
David: Yeah. Because you see in the background I have some boxing gloves, so I believe in getting your stress out however you can. For me that was training. And when I trained, I trained with power,passion, and purpose. That’s lifting weights, that’s doing aerobic stuff, that’s fighting, that’s getting your frustrations out in that environment. So it’s about having that outlet in my talk about using things such as fighting, like sparring with people, rock climbing, surfing, and extreme sports. It’s essential to be able to get out of the stress that you’re in, to be able to let go of it. Physically, mentally, and emotionally. That’s what I tell people as well, is, yes, it’s essential to be able to have that thing outside of the work environment. So many people are in this little bubble and they never escape it and that’s why they stress out. That’s why they burn out and they see themselves get lower and lower and lower until eventually they flatline. So, it’s getting out and moving with power, passion, and purpose and really letting go of this stress.
Nicole: Yeah. Yeah. I love what you’re saying. So power, passion, and purpose. That’s probably the fourth time you’ve said that. So I want to dig into that for just a second. But, I do want to say, if you’re sitting here listening and you’re like me, you’re turning 57 today, you’re like, uh, rock climbing, extreme sports. I’m not sure about that. But let me tell you a little something I’m doing. Uh, I am actually getting certified to be a yoga instructor. Now, I want to tell you, you can have the same passion. Uh, let’s say hold on. Power, passion, and purpose and, like, be all Zen. Right? So I have been going to yoga like a mad person, and I absolutely adore it, but it is a different kind of stress reliever, right? So I’m not climbing a huge mountain or boxing, although I’m all about those things if you can do them. But I think there’s all sorts of things that you could do. You could just, you know, take line dancing, for goodness sake. So yeah, definitely using your body, right? That’s fantastic. Okay, so let’s talk about your three P’s that you keep talking about. So people are like power, passion, and purpose. Oh, my gosh. All right. So when you’re talking about power, I do it with power.
How do I get that power? How do I tap into that? Where do I find it? Where is it?
David: Yeah, and that’s a great question because with that, it’s all of them really. They come together. Because when you really feel passionate about something, that’s where your whole body gets involved in it. And staying with yoga where it’s that combination of that mind, body, and spirit and that’s what you want to do. You want to really unify all of them together because when you have the passion and purpose as well that brings the power. So it’s finding those things. It’s not just turning up clock in and clock off. No, that’s not what we’re about. When you raise your vitality, everything goes along with it. And that includes like, like I said, the power, passion, and purpose. And yeah, it starts from, like you said, you’re standing there for, for the podcast, for meetings, for whatever you get up and you just move, dance, put your headphones on, etc. As I say, dance like no one’s watching because at the end of the day, no one really cares if you’re dancing. But what happens is you get that energy along with it. You move around, you get the body moving because, like you said, sitting is the new smoking. We’re so sedentary, we don’t move our bodies enough. So being able to move through space, having that awareness of where your self is, that’s a great way to find that power. And along with that comes a passion and the purpose.
Nicole: That’s right. That’s right. Yeah. And you know, I think that when I am at work, David, I totally agree with you about power and you know many people say I’m tired. Okay? So don’t miss this. David just gave you permission to take a nap. So everybody let me down. Take a nap. All right. Um, you know, because everybody’s tired. But, you know, I’ve shared on the podcast before, but I’ll share it again. There are six energies that I see inside of my coaching clients, and one is intellectual energy. You know, like, I don’t know what I need to know, but I’m not taking the time to figure out what I need to know. Right? Then there’s emotional energy. And you said that, you know, that emotional energy, like how I feel about things. And that’s why he’s telling you to snap into action. Because once you get moving, your whole emotional energy goes up. You go from maybe sad, depressed, frustrated. You start moving towards a solution like he talked about, like, give me a problem, but we got to have a solution. Then you start moving up. Then you’ve got your physical energy, you’ve got your social energy, and then you’ve got your financial energy. So all of that is power. And then I think passion and purpose is like a calling on my life. So yeah, one thing you shared with me that we didn’t capture on this podcast is that you listen to this, everybody you’re listening to. David doesn’t he sound like he was an arm wrestling athlete? I mean, did you know this was a thing? I mean, like people travel around the world arm wrestling. It’s like on ESPN, am I right?
David: Yeah, sure. And it’s a sport that I’ve just fallen into. And it was funny how that all went about. But like, with that, like with football, with arm wrestling, with fighting those things, those are sports. You can’t just dip your toe in. Same as with business. You can’t just dip your toe in what you have to do. You have to jump all the way in. And yeah, I did arm wrestling and I really enjoyed it and was on my way to the States going to some professional arm wrestling tournaments. So traveling all the way from Australia because I did really, really well. But what happened was I went to Corfu, a little island in Greece. And it was showing off some arm wrestling and got a bloke down and they wouldn’t give it to me. So I’d turn my body and I broke my snap, my humerus.
Nicole: So the humerus. This is a big deal. Snapped it. Did you hear that? That’s not the that’s not the snapping we’re talking about.
David: No, no by any means. So yeah. Yeah. And with that, that’s not the rest of the around the world holiday because I was there with my girlfriend, she was my girlfriend at the time, she stuck with me and she’s now my wife and we have a lovely little daughter as well. So I’m glad that she didn’t leave me and go, You’re an idiot who goes and breaks their arm while they’re on an island on an around the world trip. So we had to come back to Australia and get a plate put in my arm. And what happened with that is it happens. It gives me points to learn from. Like with rugby league I had to stop playing that early because I had two knee reconstructions. Arm wrestling just stopped that early because I broke my arm and my arm actually became paralyzed for four months because I hit the nerve there. And with that, that forced me to tack and it forced me to recap on my life as well. So little things like that, obstacles along the way force you to take that step back and they force you to reassess your life. What’s working, what isn’t working, take what works, discard what doesn’t. And all of these little incidences along the way have changed the trajectory of my life, which ultimately got me to fighting, which got me to my wrestling coach, which got me into speaking, which got me to where I am now. So when you’re in the moment, you can’t see the end because the tunnel is so long. But then like Steve Jobs says, you can’t connect the dots looking forward, but looking backwards, it’s abundantly clear. So every obstacle that I’ve had to overcome, there’s been a reason for it. And it’s also taught me the resilience, the strength that I have and all these other skills that were just really pushed to the bottom while I was playing football, while I was arm wrestling, while I was cage fighting. But every tool along the way has been added to the tool belt.
Nicole: That’s fantastic. Yeah. And I would say that those are skills. But also I would add, if I dare add, that they are also like now they’re like, like that steel plate in his arm, you know, that resilience it’s in. David, it’s not like something he pulls out and uses. I mean, he can, but it’s like it’s in there. It’s part of the deal. Now you want to raise your arm, there’s a plate in there. But, if David wants to take on the day, he’s using his resilience. So, you know, on the show, everybody that I know always talks about how important it is to look at the quality of your character and that integrity is of utmost importance and don’t miss it. He’s just rattling off all of these character traits he’s developed over the years and those are the things that he’s really putting to work in the world, right? So, you know, his arm is going to wear out.
He’s not 57 yet. Hello. But, you know, someday you will be sorry to break the news. Yes, but, you know, he’s saying, you know, those are the things you want to do. You want to build that character, which is in my S.H.I.N.E. coaching methodology. I love that. All right. So we are almost at the top of the hour, and you have laid down five beautiful steps to improve vitality and shared with us tips on stress management. And everybody’s like, wait, wait, wait, don’t, hey, don’t stop. So I bet you have one more fantastic, like, strategy system, something smart you want to tell us. Then put this last little nugget in our pockets to take with us. What would you like to share with the listeners that would be like, here’s the bottom line, folks.
David: Yeah. What? Love that. And it all again comes back to sports. And, like you, we mentioned at the beginning about having that coaching attitude. What I love as well is, from fighting, being able to step down from the coach and become a learner as well. So, it’s about lifelong learning and that’s in every element. There’s always room to move, there’s always room to get better, there’s always room to tighten things up that little bit. So be that lifelong learner. Even though you may have your black belt, you want to get to the black belt. Dan one. Dan two. Dan three all the way up. And even when you’re at the pinnacle, there’s still room to move. So be a lifelong learner, constantly be that athlete that wants to get that one step ahead, keep moving forward and keep moving upward as well so that it’s simple. And I know it goes back to what we did mention earlier, but that’s just the importance of it being a lifelong learner. We don’t know everything. If we had ten lives to live, we still wouldn’t know everything. And that’s a great place to be.
Nicole: Yeah, that’s right. And I can attest to that. I learned a lot from David Lindsey today. And don’t miss that I turned 57 today. So I’m still learning and I agree with you wholeheartedly. So, David Lindsey, I am so grateful that you have been on the Build a Vibrant Culture podcast. And what we need in our organizations is five steps to improve vitality. We need to be snapping into action, napping for peak performance. We need to be tapping, knowing that failure is okay. Clapping and celebrating and recapping what just happened around here because we’re all moving too fast and that will help us reduce our stress as well as living our lives with power, passion, and purpose. David, how can people find you if they want you to speak at a big event, if they want you to come in and coach, or come in and help their people. How do they find you?
David: The best place, really, is LinkedIn. I’m quite active on LinkedIn, but also feel free to email me at david@davidlindsay.com.au. I’ll be heading over to the States in November to talk at a big university summit where it’s all about mental health.
But yeah, I’m looking at speaking over there next year as well, so feel free to reach out. I love helping as many people as possible to help raise their energy, raise their vitality, and everything flows off the back of that. So yeah, email me, shoot me a message on LinkedIn. I’m more than happy to connect with everyone out there.
Nicole: Oh, that’s fantastic. David, I am so grateful for you. Where is this conference going to be? What city? What town? What state?
David: It’s in Phoenix, Arizona.
Nicole: When are you going? November.
David: It’s the first week in November. Yeah.
Nicole: Oh, thank God. Because you know what temperature it is on August 17thin Phoenix, Arizona.
David: Warm. Quite warm.
Nicole: I’m guessing 112 probably in November. It might be a nice 77 degrees. So you have time. Definitely. Yeah. Yeah. You have time. Perfect. That’s awesome. All right.
Well, David, if you get over to North Carolina, the east coast of the country, and you don’t look me up, you’re in big trouble. Bring the baby. Bring the wife here to the house and we’ll break bread. We’ll eat something. I bet you eat really healthy. I’ll make sure there’s some protein and a vegetable for you. Does that sound good? Yeah.
David: Sounds fantastic. I’ll hold you to that.
Nicole: Okay. All right, everybody. This has been another episode of the Build a Vibrant Culture podcast. I’ve had the amazingly, vitality full David Lindsay on the show again. You can find him on LinkedIn. David Lindsay. And here’s what he would like you to do. And, you know, for my birthday, would you go down and click the like button and leave a little comment, write a little nice comment, or whatever you want to write? We would like to know how we did today and how to serve you better. It’s my hope that all of this will help you build a vibrant culture. Thank you so much for listening, everyone.
Voiceover: Ready to build your vibrant culture? Bring Nicole Greer to speak to your leadership team, conference or organization to help them with their 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.
