Scaling without structure in IT often allows bad behaviors to create toxicity in a culture. The Change Architectโs executive coach, Tonya Wallace, shares an experience scaling a team where one personโs toxic behavior was limiting autonomy, creativity, and decision making. This team had recently gone from launching an innovative product to then maintaining it โ but the team hadnโt adapted its speed and practices to this new way of working.
Tonya shares how she helped bring self awareness, scalability, and structure that drastically improved trust and culture in a very quick way. Her quote blew me away, โPlay chess with your hands behind your back and all you can use is your words.โ This is influence in our modern working world. This is the key tool we have: our voice. As an ambitious leader, wouldnโt you want to use your most powerful tool in the most powerful way? This conversation will increase your power!
About Tonya Wallace:
Tonya Wallace is known as a Culture Guru and Agile Jedi. She combines leadership coaching, lean thinking and agility to develop high performing individuals and teams. As a Solutions Delivery Director for Cox Automotive, she supports one of the top revenue drivers that transforms the way cars are bought and sold within the Automotive industry.
As a technologist for over 20 years, she is the owner of Gideon VI, a M/WBE Indy based Tech company. In addition, Wallace is a John Maxwell team member, life coach, and DISC trainer, teaching self-awareness through understanding behavioral styles thereby reducing anxiety and improving communication within teams and promoting a healthy team culture.
As a DEI enthusiast, she is known for her dynamic and engaging speaking style and information packed facilitation. Also known as "The Sports Mom", Wallace enjoys spending time with all six of her children, watching them thrive in Corporate America, entrepreneurship, and in the athletic arena. She loves to use her skills to combine agile principles, leadership skills and emotional intelligence strategies to drive a sense of ownership and self motivation to empower, influence and motivate those around her to raise the bar to achieve personal and professional goals. She feels blessed to be a vessel to others!
Read the full blog post here: https://thechangearchitects.com/scaling-without-structure-creates-burnout-in-it-with-tonya-wallace/
[00:00:10] Hey there, friend. You're listening to the Hot Mess Hotline and this is Stefanie Krievins.
[00:00:15] You are totally in the right place if you're an ambitious leader who's charged with delivering on the tech of the future right now.
[00:00:23] In order to do that, you and your team need to upskill and tackle old problems with new ways of thinking.
[00:00:30] In the past, we would have called this change management and leadership development,
[00:00:35] but change is now the air that we breathe and your team needs a unified strategy for the 21st century.
[00:00:41] And that's what we have for you here.
[00:00:43] Today's conversation is with a member of our faculty, Tanya Wallace.
[00:00:49] She is an amazing executive coach that we are bringing on to help our IT leaders and our clients with their toughest leadership moments.
[00:01:00] You're going to hear in our conversation today why Tanya is known as the culture guru and the agile Jedi.
[00:01:07] And part of the uniqueness that Tanya brings to our team is that she is an IT leader in the trenches with you, with our clients every single day.
[00:01:17] So this is if you want to use the word side hustle, this is her side hustle doing executive coaching for us.
[00:01:23] She's a John Maxwell certified speaker and trainer.
[00:01:26] She's a disc consultant.
[00:01:27] She's an executive coach.
[00:01:28] I mean, she does it all.
[00:01:30] But the reason she is part of the team is because she brings a perspective that you can learn from.
[00:01:37] So with that, let's dig into that conversation.
[00:01:40] Tanya, I am so grateful to be having this conversation with you.
[00:01:44] So our listeners can get to know you better in your style.
[00:01:47] Let's start first with your successes as a coach and share some really good stories about how you've supported people and clients
[00:01:57] as a coach so we can hear about your awesomeness.
[00:02:01] First of all, thank you so much for having me.
[00:02:03] It's such a blessing to be here and to be able to share with fellow game changers in various industries here.
[00:02:13] Yes, yes, yes.
[00:02:15] So I was thinking about like what would be like the most impactful story for me to be able to, you know, relay it to the audience.
[00:02:24] And it has to be when I took over my area that I'm in right now, which is the e-commerce delivery stream.
[00:02:33] So I am a delivery stream engineer or director of solution delivery.
[00:02:38] And what I do is I optimize individuals and teams to be their best.
[00:02:43] And so our output there is a digital workflow and we change the way people buy and sell and use cars and vehicles at coxswain moment.
[00:02:51] So they put me in a space that had the lowest ENPS score and they did it very purposeful.
[00:02:59] I was super blessed because I did not know that for six months the VPs had been asking for me to come over to their area and do the
[00:03:08] things that I had done in my previous area and help build the culture.
[00:03:12] So I'm known as a culture guru, culture expert and come in there and help people to grow.
[00:03:18] So when I moved into the new space, they had a very young entrepreneurial mindset.
[00:03:25] Everybody was kind of coming into that space and building up this brand new innovative AI machine learning technology and really just kind of
[00:03:35] forming and just very autonomous.
[00:03:37] No structure or nothing.
[00:03:39] Right. Well, because of that, there was a lot of pressure on that culture.
[00:03:46] People were working weekends.
[00:03:47] They were working late.
[00:03:49] There were a lot of oversight with VPs and just no structure.
[00:03:54] Right. They weren't having fun anymore.
[00:03:56] It was fun when they first came in with that entrepreneurial go-getter.
[00:04:00] And when they hit that first milestone, they were like, yes, we did it.
[00:04:03] And they're like, yes, no, go scale, go scale.
[00:04:06] And as they're scaling, of course, they're doing more and their teams are growing and knowledge is transferring and all the things are
[00:04:13] happening.
[00:04:14] But when you scale and you don't have structure and you don't focus on building the culture, then the culture doesn't thrive and the
[00:04:22] people don't thrive and the technology isn't as great.
[00:04:25] Right.
[00:04:26] And so they brought me into this area and kind of dropped me in the wilderness in there and I'm like, hey, I'm here.
[00:04:33] And I came to the first meeting and I'm known as just an energy bunny.
[00:04:39] I love bringing energy into spaces.
[00:04:42] And so I'm on camera and I'm like, hey guys, what's good?
[00:04:44] What's going on?
[00:04:45] And they're like very monotone.
[00:04:48] Oh, I know.
[00:04:50] Like boohoo.
[00:04:51] What's going on here?
[00:04:53] And so I immediately for the first the first meeting I just started to engage people.
[00:04:59] And so I think that that is probably the one thing that's so I'm going to go and drop a nuggets along the way.
[00:05:05] But the first thing is to engage people.
[00:05:08] I find that sometimes a lot of leaders come into spaces and they're not really seeing people as people.
[00:05:15] They're seeing the work.
[00:05:17] Yes.
[00:05:17] And so you have to be very cognizant and very careful to make sure that you have separate agendas.
[00:05:24] See the people and then see the work.
[00:05:27] As if you focus on developing and optimizing people, the teams will grow.
[00:05:32] If the teams are optimized, the work will get done and your goals will be met.
[00:05:36] People started to reach out to me and we started to have these Vegas sessions.
[00:05:42] Vegas sessions?
[00:05:44] Yeah.
[00:05:45] Oh, tell us more.
[00:05:46] I've never heard this term before.
[00:05:48] I know.
[00:05:49] I like it.
[00:05:50] Vegas sessions.
[00:05:50] And they would drop me little nuggets and they would say hey, you know, I just want to let you know I was like they were pinning me on like 8 o'clock on Sunday.
[00:05:59] And I was like, oh wow.
[00:06:00] Like where's the why?
[00:06:03] Like what why is that happening?
[00:06:05] Right.
[00:06:05] So it's not just about the behavior of crossing the lines.
[00:06:09] It's about why is that happening?
[00:06:11] What can we do to alleviate and get people answers within the in the space of time that they need?
[00:06:16] So I started having one-on-ones and I started building trust.
[00:06:19] So not just bringing the energy into the meeting, helping to bring inclusion within the meetings, helping to celebrate birthdays and anniversaries and you know graduations and things like that.
[00:06:31] Where people started to feel like people again.
[00:06:34] Yes.
[00:06:34] Not just employees, but they started to feel like people and we started to care about one another.
[00:06:41] And so when I would have these one-on-ones, these Vegas sessions with each of the teams, they started to share and I started to document the patterns of behaviors that they were saying and they were letting me know.
[00:06:53] That gave me an entire backlog of things that I needed to do and problems that I needed to tackle along the way.
[00:07:03] People and process, right?
[00:07:06] And so what I one of the common things themes that I had problems with was one of the people in there.
[00:07:15] So I had I found out that there was a major major cancer that we had within that environment.
[00:07:23] They would come into meetings.
[00:07:24] They will create spin.
[00:07:26] Yes, they would derail priorities.
[00:07:31] They weren't focused on things.
[00:07:33] And so as I collected information and feedback, there were two approaches that I could take and I wanted to take the lighter one first.
[00:07:45] So that I hopefully didn't have to get to the harder one.
[00:07:48] Yes.
[00:07:49] So the lighter approach was to help this person wake up in their behavior.
[00:07:55] And so as a behavior expert, a disconsultant and trainer, I love behavior.
[00:08:02] I love understanding that people are not wanting to just be disruptive.
[00:08:07] Correct.
[00:08:08] A lot of times it's just they have their single focus and they don't mean it, but they don't understand the repercussions.
[00:08:16] They can't see outside of where their needs are.
[00:08:19] Yes, or they have needs that they're trying to get met that they can't articulate to others to themselves.
[00:08:25] Yes.
[00:08:26] And yeah, and they create disruption and they need help with their awareness.
[00:08:30] Yes.
[00:08:31] Full disclosure, I've been that person.
[00:08:33] So no judgment.
[00:08:34] We've all been that person.
[00:08:36] I think we've all been.
[00:08:37] I was going to say, I think we've all been that person before, you know, really tackling that emotional intelligence part.
[00:08:42] We've all been that person.
[00:08:43] So I came to that person and at that time they were high level.
[00:08:47] They were in the C-suite.
[00:08:49] And so I had already established a really good relationship with them because I understood their personality
[00:08:56] because their personality and their behavior style is like mine.
[00:09:00] And they're very straightforward, extremely direct, right?
[00:09:04] Really just focused and kind of impatient.
[00:09:06] And when you're impatient and you're under stress, you get aggressive.
[00:09:09] And so when you're dealing with people who don't have that behavior set, it scares people, right?
[00:09:15] And so I came to them and kind of let them know, hey, this is what I'm saying in the meeting.
[00:09:21] It wasn't about other people.
[00:09:22] It wasn't about information other people were giving me.
[00:09:24] It was about my reactions to the things that were being said inside of those meetings.
[00:09:30] You know, hey, you know, when you said this, I noticed like there was a quietness in the room, right?
[00:09:36] And so I started to help that person kind of wake up.
[00:09:39] And that happened for months.
[00:09:41] I was trying different tactics in different ways.
[00:09:44] And unfortunately, that particular behavior and that particular person did really just did not want to change that.
[00:09:54] And so I was left, Stephanie, with a decision.
[00:09:58] Decision is going to be either that person or the entire delivery string.
[00:10:04] Yes.
[00:10:05] Thankfully, I had the confidence of another person in the C-suite and we were able to talk about some of the behaviors.
[00:10:13] And unbeknownst to me, because I had just gotten in that area, you know, months ago,
[00:10:17] this person was already escalated under the microscope and things like that.
[00:10:22] And so I had to impart my advice and said, hey, you know, you really got a choice here.
[00:10:30] You're either going to keep this super smart person,
[00:10:34] but disruptive person that you're not going to be able to build a culture that you want to build.
[00:10:39] Or you're going to have to, you know, help them to exit or put them in another part of the organization
[00:10:46] to focus on the one of the number one initiatives within the company.
[00:10:51] And we're going to have to really work on the culture here.
[00:10:55] And so as months went by, that person through natural or forced attrition,
[00:11:01] don't want to tell you which one, ended up, you know, leaving the company.
[00:11:06] And I, you know, my mission was just to move forward.
[00:11:11] And so now it was focusing on who are my high performers and who are my low performers.
[00:11:17] And so helping my high performers become even more optimal within their space,
[00:11:22] more disciplined within their space, helping, actually helping them to understand what the future was for them
[00:11:30] and the visibility and the opportunities were for them because they were already go-getters
[00:11:34] and they just needed that carrot angle.
[00:11:37] And then also to identify my low performers and partner them with people
[00:11:43] that could coach them within their discipline and partner with them to be the best they can.
[00:11:48] In addition, process, a tackled process.
[00:11:51] Real quick, Tanya, I want to go back because this is what you're, what you're queuing up.
[00:11:56] And I have a clarifying question here.
[00:11:58] What you're queuing up is the dilemma that so many leaders face constantly.
[00:12:02] And I'm so grateful that you are a well-equipped manager as coach
[00:12:08] and a well-equipped executive coach for us here at The Change Architects.
[00:12:12] And you hold a unique position for us because most of our coaches are former managers as coaches,
[00:12:18] but now just do executive coaching.
[00:12:19] And so you are living right alongside the leaders that you're coaching for us,
[00:12:23] which I just think is such a wonderful blessing to those that get to work with you.
[00:12:29] Thank you.
[00:12:30] And they have that same dilemma, someone who is high performing in several ways,
[00:12:36] super smart yet toxic to the culture.
[00:12:39] And they have to make those very hard decisions.
[00:12:42] What were you able to see about the culture from a new perspective as a manager
[00:12:47] once that person was no longer creating that toxicity?
[00:12:52] Autonomy.
[00:12:55] Say more.
[00:12:56] People were able to think on their own.
[00:12:59] They were able to self-organize.
[00:13:02] They were able to have their stress level completely went down.
[00:13:07] Yes.
[00:13:07] They were able to innovate at a higher level.
[00:13:12] We were able to self-organize in so many different ways.
[00:13:18] I can't even tell you the variety of ways we're able to self-organize.
[00:13:21] People are smart.
[00:13:23] I think sometimes companies forget, you did hire very smart people.
[00:13:27] Yes.
[00:13:31] Something's going on where...
[00:13:32] So the problem with having the command control approach that was happening
[00:13:39] within that particular environment, it was stifling the creativity and innovation of very smart people.
[00:13:46] And so once that was lifted off and they had room to breathe, it was scary for them.
[00:13:52] I'll just be real honest.
[00:13:53] They were afraid.
[00:13:55] Yes.
[00:13:55] They were scared because now they're like, wait a minute.
[00:13:58] I don't have this person coming into the meeting telling me what to do.
[00:14:01] I actually have to think now for myself.
[00:14:04] And so me, part of my job is to be that cheerleader and that supporter and that driver.
[00:14:10] Right?
[00:14:11] So behind the scenes what I was doing was working with their manager to help hold them accountable through their own KPIs.
[00:14:19] Right?
[00:14:19] Their own deliverables, their own goals, their own development items to tie that performance to behavior and lock it.
[00:14:28] Right?
[00:14:28] So it's like, hey, here's the expectation that we have from a managerial perspective.
[00:14:35] And here's the room that you have to do it.
[00:14:39] And you also have the ability to ask for help, have coaching, mentorship and partnership to be able to take yourself to wherever you want to go.
[00:14:48] So it's not just a one approach option.
[00:14:52] Like you have to have multiple pieces within that strategy.
[00:14:57] Yes.
[00:14:57] Okay.
[00:14:58] That's awesome.
[00:14:59] For you as that leader as well, the things that you're navigating on the back end that you can't be completely transparent about because of the HR issues involved,
[00:15:08] because of the emotions, because of the layers and the types of leaders.
[00:15:13] And in some ways you have to ask for people's trust.
[00:15:17] I'm not trying to put words in your mouth, but just making an observation about what they might be feeling, what you might be feeling in those moments is just you have to navigate your pieces as well.
[00:15:27] But you can't always be transparent about it.
[00:15:28] And I think that stinks sometimes and people just don't understand that.
[00:15:32] Yeah, and I think, you know, I always say one of the my coin phrase, play chess with your hands tied behind your back.
[00:15:45] And all you have to do, all you have is your ability to influence.
[00:15:49] That is the game we play within corporate America.
[00:15:51] We have to listen with empathy.
[00:15:55] We have to understand how we show up as leaders.
[00:16:00] How do people perceive me when I walk into a room?
[00:16:04] I have to know that I have to be able to look and scan the room and see who's sitting back because I walked in, you know,
[00:16:12] who's sitting up, who's agitated with my presence.
[00:16:16] I have to be able to see that so that I can go ahead and connect with that person or understand where I am in my space.
[00:16:25] Yes.
[00:16:26] To be able to navigate that.
[00:16:28] Yes.
[00:16:29] So I can choose to walk into the space, identify a pattern of behavior, and then strategically influence that behavior in my favor.
[00:16:41] That is so powerful.
[00:16:42] And there's like we don't have a three hour long conversation podcast to dig into like strategic influence skills.
[00:16:49] But that's a whole other topic in and of itself.
[00:16:52] It sure is.
[00:16:53] So smart.
[00:16:54] So, so, so, so, so smart.
[00:16:56] Let's circle that back to because you did walk us through, you know, identifying your high performers,
[00:17:01] identifying and helping them understand their career path now that some of these other roadblocks were gone.
[00:17:08] Building in process, you mentioned.
[00:17:11] You know, what was what was your strategic approach to the low performers now that some of these other excuses were now cleared,
[00:17:18] cleared from the table, if you will.
[00:17:20] Yeah.
[00:17:21] So okay.
[00:17:22] So that layered approach had to be multiple things, right?
[00:17:26] Understanding the behavior of the low performance is super critical because each of these behavior sets has a different strategy in and of itself.
[00:17:37] Sometimes the low performers were low performers.
[00:17:40] I'll give you just one example because again, we don't have three and a half hours.
[00:17:45] I had one low performer who was a high analyst.
[00:17:49] And so it very, very analytical people have a tendency to have a perfectionist vein.
[00:17:55] Yes.
[00:17:56] The perfectionist vein makes them slow to respond and slow to change.
[00:18:04] So they were always seen as resistant, not having enough time, always asking more questions.
[00:18:11] And it appeared it was it was there was a perception that they didn't understand.
[00:18:16] They didn't get it.
[00:18:16] They didn't you know, and so they had all of these perceived behaviors that people were thinking they were saying,
[00:18:24] but actually had to do with everything about just his personality and his behavior.
[00:18:28] Yes.
[00:18:29] So when I was working with him, I was able to help him to understand who he was because that's like self-awareness is step one.
[00:18:39] Yes.
[00:18:39] Yes.
[00:18:41] Because oftentimes without self-awareness people see their perspective as right and others as wrong.
[00:18:46] And that's not what this is.
[00:18:48] It is your perspective is your perspective.
[00:18:50] Sometimes the tools in your toolbox are helpful and sometimes they're not especially in an innovative fast driving culture.
[00:18:57] We got to reconcile those speeds.
[00:18:59] Yes, 100% and a lot of times to add on to that people don't see themselves in how others are receiving their behaviors.
[00:19:10] So as they become more self-aware and it does honestly doesn't take too long for people to just say,
[00:19:20] you know, I am like that.
[00:19:22] Well, how do you think so?
[00:19:23] It's just that those coach the open questions.
[00:19:26] How do you think people perceive that, you know, when you are not responding to the emails because you're thinking about it and taking in more information.
[00:19:35] You really doing the work like you're over there like crunching down.
[00:19:38] You're over there six hours, but you haven't responded to the email yet.
[00:19:42] You haven't responded to the pic.
[00:19:44] How do you see it?
[00:19:45] How do you think other people are receiving that man?
[00:19:48] They must think I'm either lazy or so they answering their own questions, right?
[00:19:54] And so they're like, oh my gosh, how to then strategy one strategy and I'm an Agilist, right?
[00:20:01] So everything, you know, sits within the agile space.
[00:20:03] So it's a matter of like, okay, how do we time boxes?
[00:20:06] How do we iterate this?
[00:20:07] How do we go and work in sprints and have Jake small chunks and do wins?
[00:20:10] And you know, until it's a matter of shifting some of those behaviors.
[00:20:14] So when somebody pings you what's a simple thing that you think you can do.
[00:20:19] I mean, I guess I can just tell them that, you know, I saw it.
[00:20:22] I got it.
[00:20:22] I'm going to respond to you by and then put the time.
[00:20:25] Okay, so what is the time duty?
[00:20:27] If you say that you're going to respond by 2 p.m.
[00:20:29] Okay, well then that means that I can't spend too much time on it have literally two hours to get this out.
[00:20:35] So instead of the perfectionist and spinning all day in the next day.
[00:20:38] Now you have a time box of two hours to get that thing out of there.
[00:20:42] Wow, that's amazing.
[00:20:44] Yeah.
[00:20:45] Yes.
[00:20:45] And so you just see that performance go off.
[00:20:47] Yes.
[00:20:48] Yes.
[00:20:49] And you see the relationships go up too because now there's that common understanding and that that connection that wasn't there before the trust.
[00:20:57] Yes.
[00:20:58] Oh, that's the good thing.
[00:21:00] Juicy.
[00:21:00] It's so good.
[00:21:02] And it's what I love about these stories is I feel like folks put the pressure on themselves to create big change with big action.
[00:21:10] And it's these small moments, these small seemingly seemingly small questions that just create these little pivots and then another pivot and then another pivot.
[00:21:20] And all of a sudden you look back six months and you can see the tremendous growth that's happened, the tremendous change that's happened,
[00:21:27] the increased trust, the feeling on the team like the vibe is just good again.
[00:21:34] You see the fun faces on the camera like those were all from these micro moments of positivity and openness that added up.
[00:21:42] Yes.
[00:21:43] That create huge change.
[00:21:44] And you know, one of the greatest benefits of that as well in addition to that, they're okay to fail.
[00:21:55] Yes.
[00:21:56] People are people are okay failing out loud and it creates a culture of openness and courage.
[00:22:02] Right.
[00:22:03] They're like, you know what?
[00:22:04] I screwed up on this.
[00:22:05] But here's what I learned.
[00:22:07] I feel like one of the greatest culture improvements that I made in that in the area that I'm in right now is continuous improvement.
[00:22:17] Relentless focus on optimize everything.
[00:22:22] Everything at every second and not just wait until the end of the month, end of the four, end of the week.
[00:22:29] If you have something that came up and you had a problem and you solved it, we want to know now.
[00:22:35] We want to know right now because if there's something that we can share broadly with our leadership group and they can learn from that and they're like,
[00:22:42] oh, I'm literally going through that problem right now.
[00:22:45] It creates that I should say stimulates.
[00:22:50] Yes.
[00:22:50] The conversation of being focused on continuous improvement.
[00:22:55] Yes.
[00:22:56] Yes.
[00:22:57] We have recently tightened down our project management process and become very deliberate about using agile processes.
[00:23:07] I wouldn't say I'm an Agilist like you are Tanya, but we're doing our thing.
[00:23:11] We're practicing it.
[00:23:12] We're piloting it, which I guess by definition makes us Agilist.
[00:23:15] But you know, but we started doing daily priorities.
[00:23:19] We do a daily sync via chat and then provide just real time coaching.
[00:23:23] You know, for example, hey, you're over committed on this one and someone other team members got this going on.
[00:23:29] I need you to step in over there too because you can help sometimes as capacity, sometimes as expertise.
[00:23:35] But what it has done and we literally just implemented this the last week and a half is forcing us to have the misalignment conversations,
[00:23:46] which then forces the good kind of conflict about the work.
[00:23:50] Yes.
[00:23:50] That is speeding us up is powerful is gets our juices going, you know, gets more creative forces us to like say what is the problem that we're actually solving for here?
[00:24:03] Like because as you know in too many workplaces, we start solutionizing for stuff and we're like, oh, what are we problem solving for?
[00:24:10] Oh, I don't know.
[00:24:11] But we had another good idea, especially with innovative people.
[00:24:14] Right.
[00:24:14] It's like another good idea.
[00:24:15] Another good idea.
[00:24:17] It has become unbelievably powerful and allow us to wrestle with alignment issues in priority setting because we're such a small team as you know,
[00:24:26] but I'm like, oh, I cannot wait to share more of this with our clients because of what it's the focus that it's forcing for us.
[00:24:36] I can't say all those words.
[00:24:38] The focus is working for us.
[00:24:40] You're nailing it.
[00:24:42] You're nailing it because priorities are our king, right?
[00:24:47] But then also to add on to Miss Agilis on the other side of the camera over there is your whip limit, your work in progress.
[00:24:57] Then you have now you have the ability for your team members to say, Stephanie, how many things do you actually work on?
[00:25:05] And you're being like five.
[00:25:08] So we agreed team norms, team agreements.
[00:25:11] We agree that we would only work on two to three things at a time.
[00:25:15] Yes.
[00:25:15] So then that team member has the ability and the privilege to challenge you and say what two are you dropping?
[00:25:22] Yes.
[00:25:23] Oh, that's so smart.
[00:25:24] A whip limit.
[00:25:25] We literally just had the version of that conversation yesterday without the good terminology.
[00:25:33] Oh my gosh.
[00:25:35] This is also something that our clients experience a lot is I'll use the word whip limit too many irons in the fire,
[00:25:43] too many good ideas rolling, too many things that I've gone on for too long.
[00:25:48] What is your approach to coaching around better understanding capacity, better understanding,
[00:25:54] you know what the human brain can actually get done and focus on?
[00:25:58] Yeah, there's a great book out there.
[00:26:02] I think it's called Essentialism, I believe.
[00:26:04] I think.
[00:26:04] Oh, yes.
[00:26:05] Greg McCallen.
[00:26:07] Yes.
[00:26:08] God that book made me angry.
[00:26:12] But I would say that value.
[00:26:15] That's it.
[00:26:16] Mic drop.
[00:26:17] End of story period point blank.
[00:26:18] Value.
[00:26:19] Value.
[00:26:20] Yes.
[00:26:21] You have gotten so I'll give you a story and then I'll tie it to executive priorities.
[00:26:27] So we have a product backlog.
[00:26:30] Okay, this backlog comes from architecture, engineering, product business, and it's a single backlog.
[00:26:37] Everything filters in and we have a stack priority list, right?
[00:26:41] Yep.
[00:26:41] And so when they go when we go through our discovery process and we're looking at that problem to solve,
[00:26:48] what's the problem statement?
[00:26:49] What are we what are we trying to solve here?
[00:26:52] And then we look at the success criteria of what is the value that this thing if we decide to do it is going to solve?
[00:27:00] Yes.
[00:27:01] If it if it passes the problem discovery lane, it goes into now solutioning.
[00:27:08] Now it has enough value in it to now be able to solution.
[00:27:15] A lot of times we don't stop and look at the problem that we're trying to solve and identify and quantify the value,
[00:27:24] right?
[00:27:24] Project management practice is doable and is it feasible?
[00:27:28] Right.
[00:27:29] So you have to drive the conversation of value in your and then take that and then now push it over to your own backlog.
[00:27:36] So an executive has a backlog, they have to tie that to the value.
[00:27:42] I have 20 things that I'm working on.
[00:27:45] Can I group this into whether it's it's tied to my performance?
[00:27:50] Right.
[00:27:50] Is it tied to my bonus?
[00:27:54] Tied to my performance, my bonus.
[00:27:57] Is this something that's going to be tied to optimizing another particular error?
[00:28:02] So then you start to slot it.
[00:28:03] Then you can look at your your timeline and say I have the and then you time box it.
[00:28:09] Yes.
[00:28:09] So value, value and priority and time box it and then have your time.
[00:28:18] Sorry, timeline it like a roadmap and then time box it so that you're very contained within solving that that problem.
[00:28:26] So sometimes you'll have many subcommittees or cohorts that are working on different things that all feed up.
[00:28:33] Right.
[00:28:34] And so you'll say, okay, this is a group of things that I need to work with.
[00:28:38] Here's the people that I've delegated it to and here's the accountability that I'm going to have and I'm going to put them in a time box.
[00:28:45] I need this done by end of quarter three.
[00:28:48] Yes.
[00:28:48] Yeah, unbelievably powerful.
[00:28:50] And it's and again, this is why you're one of our game changers.
[00:28:53] One of our changemakers here like I've been my soapbox this year so far is I think in our workplaces we have forgotten that our job is to deliver value together.
[00:29:05] Yes.
[00:29:06] The key word being value and together and there's an exchange of money.
[00:29:15] There's an exchange of time.
[00:29:16] There's an exchange of knowledge.
[00:29:18] There's an exchange of trust in order to deliver value.
[00:29:22] Yeah, and we have to recognize that oftentimes it's our leaders job and this is why they need support through executive coaching why we need team coaching.
[00:29:31] It's our executives job to define what value is based on the strategic plan based on KPIs based on bonus plan, you know those layers.
[00:29:42] But it's the leaders job to define value and what's the drop dead deadline deadline like what's the speed that we will work at and how do we do that?
[00:29:52] There's a quick story.
[00:29:53] So long time ago I was working as a Scrum Master and we were pivoting so they wanted us to stop work and pivot.
[00:30:02] Okay, and so my job as a Scrum Master is to maintain the balance right maintain everybody's good good mood good attitude.
[00:30:11] And so thinking about how am I going to message this right message or pivot keep like we're in the middle of a sprint like it's hands around keyboard.
[00:30:21] Like how do I do this thing?
[00:30:22] Right.
[00:30:22] I'm a little younger than I am today.
[00:30:25] And so I said to myself well, here's the question.
[00:30:31] If they're not working on something that is valuable, what would they want to continue coding it tomorrow?
[00:30:40] And so that was a game changer for me and something that I've always carried with me in communicating pivots.
[00:30:49] We don't want to just pivot on the dime all the time because that insinuates you have a problem Houston.
[00:30:54] There's a problem.
[00:30:55] There's a problem with your intake your priorities your if you're shifting priorities and things like that that are happening.
[00:31:02] We've got to meet we've got fixed that.
[00:31:04] Yes, that's a version of hot mess.
[00:31:05] It's chaos inducing not good.
[00:31:08] Yes, all of that.
[00:31:10] There is a too innovative.
[00:31:11] There's such thing as being too innovative.
[00:31:12] Absolutely.
[00:31:13] Absolutely because there's a cost of delay.
[00:31:17] Yes, a cost of that pivot.
[00:31:18] You're so smart Tanya.
[00:31:20] You didn't say this in the paper and then I did.
[00:31:22] Like mine's like mine's like mine's.
[00:31:25] So I feel like you know, I've always carried that with me.
[00:31:28] It's like wait a minute if I'm going to message this I need to be on board first.
[00:31:32] That's what's a change management change management practices right?
[00:31:35] Like wait a minute.
[00:31:36] Okay, so you want me to message this to 38 teams that I'm cool with that.
[00:31:40] So let me get on board.
[00:31:42] Let me understand the value of why we're stopping something where we're starting something so I can get excited about it because if I'm excited about it,
[00:31:49] I can communicate my excitement to the next person and I can help them understand you know,
[00:31:54] like literally the thing that you're working on right now has shifted from like number two to like number 22.
[00:32:01] So this is all tied to our OKRs and our KPIs and our bonus structure and our success in the industry.
[00:32:10] And so what we need to do because we heard from the environment that they wanted this and it makes sense to us.
[00:32:17] We have the ability to be thought leaders and innovative leaders in the industry.
[00:32:20] So let's go do this.
[00:32:21] How about that?
[00:32:22] Everybody's like yeah, let's go.
[00:32:26] Yes, so smart.
[00:32:28] Oh my gosh again, I'm just so grateful to have your wisdom, your guidance,
[00:32:33] your coaching style with us because you're in the trenches with our leaders.
[00:32:40] And that just brings that just brings a level of expertise that our leaders need.
[00:32:44] I'm so excited.
[00:32:46] All right.
[00:32:47] Yeah, two questions here and I'll let you get back to changing your part of the world until we connect again.
[00:32:54] How would you describe your coaching style?
[00:32:56] Because I'm a disc consultant and I specialize in behavior.
[00:33:01] I believe that coaching has to be a fingerprint.
[00:33:06] Meaning that.
[00:33:11] Meaning that it's that person on the other side of the screen that I need to understand.
[00:33:18] Because if I come in and help them and I have a an assumption of what I'm going to do with that person
[00:33:27] that I'm going to be immediately wrong.
[00:33:29] And so what I need to understand is who they are as a person,
[00:33:33] what their goals are, how they come across,
[00:33:36] how self-aware they are so that I'm able to help that person understand their strengths.
[00:33:44] Make sure that they're leading with their strengths.
[00:33:49] Help them use their strengths to identify problems in their area
[00:33:53] and then strategically attack each problem using a customized fingerprinted solution
[00:33:58] that they're comfortable with leading.
[00:34:00] Because if you just put things out there, you know the saying you can bring a horse to water can't make a drink.
[00:34:08] Yes.
[00:34:08] So this is about helping the person optimize.
[00:34:13] And that is my my sole goal is to help those those folks understand who they are.
[00:34:20] Help them optimize within their strengths and then help them to adjust to different behaviors
[00:34:27] that they're seeing within their environment so that they can win.
[00:34:32] Awesome.
[00:34:33] Awesome.
[00:34:33] Again, alignment is why we're together.
[00:34:38] Just the synchronicity of us coming together is just pure magic.
[00:34:45] Last question.
[00:34:46] What do you think is important for folks to know about choosing you as a coach?
[00:34:50] Oh, get ready for some hard work.
[00:34:55] Yes.
[00:34:56] Meaning that looking inside is hard.
[00:35:00] It could go anywhere.
[00:35:02] And I am I'm a homework gal.
[00:35:04] Like I do ask folks to do their homework.
[00:35:09] And I think the number one thing that people need to know within working with me is stay woke
[00:35:15] because that will be from the first session.
[00:35:17] If there are things that we uncover within the sessions that we have, you have to stay well.
[00:35:23] It is not just waking up within that particular hour that you and I are talking.
[00:35:27] This is about making sure that you're taking that information that you have activities that happen out of that.
[00:35:33] You have retrospectives.
[00:35:34] You're reflecting constantly so that we can reflect and share and keep those things building as we go forward.
[00:35:41] Yes, yes.
[00:35:42] Agree completely because our job is to not be with our client for forever.
[00:35:48] It's to equip them to live the life of their dreams, their career of their dreams.
[00:35:52] Yeah.
[00:35:53] And we're guides for an amount of time.
[00:35:56] But this is your life.
[00:35:57] This is your career.
[00:35:58] This is your leadership style.
[00:36:00] You have to do the work, but Tanya is going to support you and invite you into something and love you real hard along the way.
[00:36:10] Which is what real coaching does.
[00:36:13] Like that's, you know, it's pure compassion at its finest because we want what's best for you, but only you know what's best for you.
[00:36:22] Yeah, it's the confidence.
[00:36:24] You know when the eagle has left the nest, when the confidence is so high that they can think on their own.
[00:36:31] Yes.
[00:36:31] Create solutions on their own and fly on their own.
[00:36:34] Yes.
[00:36:35] Yes, yes, yes.
[00:36:36] My gosh.
[00:36:37] Well, thank you again, Tanya for this conversation, for your time, for your expertise, for your willingness to do this with us.
[00:36:44] Just so, so grateful.
[00:36:45] I it's never lost on me that none of us get to do this work alone.
[00:36:51] And that's the magic of all of this.
[00:36:53] So thank you.
[00:36:54] Thank you, Stephanie.
[00:36:55] I appreciate you.
[00:36:56] Great to be a part of the team.
[00:36:58] Yay.
[00:36:59] Yay.
[00:37:00] Okay.
[00:37:01] So if you were watching this episode on video, you saw me feverishly taking notes.
[00:37:05] So many good things.
[00:37:06] I feel like this was like a free consulting and coaching session in and of itself with this conversation with Tanya.
[00:37:12] I learned so much and just some of my I just want to share with you my key takeaways and I would love to hear yours wherever you're watching
[00:37:20] listening in to but did you hear what she said?
[00:37:24] Number one, engage people have two separate agendas your agenda for how you work with people to engage them in their work and how to engage the work to get that done.
[00:37:36] And I believe what Tanya believes if you engage people the work will take care of itself not vice versa.
[00:37:44] Because we're all human beings coming together trying to deliver value together to be self-aware to communicate to build trust.
[00:37:54] And if as a leader you can help people with self-awareness see them for who they are help them have the right kind of right kind of autonomy for their role.
[00:38:06] They will in essence pay you back pay the team back by doing the right work at the right time with the right resources.
[00:38:13] And so that's really my biggest takeaway here is is how do you engage people in the work not how do you do the work by engaging people that priority is the right level people first work second.
[00:38:27] So if you're digging what Tanya is putting down around agile about coaching about disc about leadership would love to talk to you more about working with Tanya.
[00:38:37] But if anything I just hope you got as much from that conversation as I did now let's get back to changing your part of the world delivering value with your colleagues.
[00:38:49] And if you got value from this episode and would share it with another change maker game changer in your network I would be so so grateful because that helps us get this message of fix and hat messes creating pro trouble makers leading change in the 21st century to more and more people and I'll see you soon my friend.