Intentional Leaders Podcast with Cyndi Wentland
Welcome to the Intentional Leaders Podcast with Cyndi Wentland. Where we’re all about creating confident, successful, and focused leaders who manage with purpose and impact. I’m Cyndi Wentland, the founder of Intentionaleaders. And I’m passionate about learning, teaching, and coaching on all things leadership related. My purpose is to equip leaders like you with the tools, resources, and support to accomplish your goals. To learn when you want, how you want. So, if you’re an aspiring leader, first-time manager, experienced executive, or you just want to make a bigger impact in your role as an individual contributor—this podcast is for you. Because each week we’ll focus on relevant, applicable, and easy to implement skills and practices—to create focus and a deliberate path to employee engagement and business results. I know that leadership has its challenges but learning to lead shouldn’t be one of them.
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Intentional Leaders Podcast with Cyndi Wentland
Transform Your Internal Operating System to Upgrade Your Leadership with Ryan Gottfredson
Ryan Gottfredson explains the transformational journey from being focused solely on doing better to becoming better as a human being, drawing on his research and latest book. He introduces the distinction between our "doing side" (talents, knowledge, skills) versus our "being side" (quality of our internal operating system), showing how genuine transformation requires upgrading who we are, not just what we do.
• Most developmental efforts focus on the doing side, but transformational growth requires improving our being side
• Vertical development upgrades our internal operating system to respond more effectively to challenges
• The becoming better journey starts with awakening to our current wiring and how it affects our responses
• Most organizations promote high-doing leaders without considering their being side quality
• Microsoft's transformation under Satya Nadella demonstrates the power of high-being leadership
• 70% of adults have experienced trauma that has wired their nervous system for self-protection
• Surface-level strategies like meditation and deeper approaches like mindset work can help refine our internal operating system
• The goal is becoming a "brighter light" in our spheres of influence through personal transformation
Reach out to Ryan if you take his mindset assessment or read his book "Becoming Better" – he's offered to connect with listeners and discuss your results.
I'd love to hear from you! Send a text message.
Be the Best Leader You Know
Perform with Power, Lead with Impact, Inspire Growth
To sharpen your skills and increase your confidence, check out the Confident Leader Course: https://www.intentionaleaders.com/confident-leader
Welcome to the Intentional Leaders Podcast. I am your host, cindy Wettlund, and today I have the distinct honor of talking again to Ryan Godfreytson. So if you are a listener of my podcast, I have interviewed Ryan before. He is a consultant and also an associate professor at University of California in Fullerton and he has written several books that have transformed my business and the way that I am showing up, and he started with Success Mindsets great read. The Elevated Leader building on that super awesome tailored to leadership. And his third and final not final, but next book is called Becoming Better and it is about how do we become better as human beings Not just doing things better, but being better.
Speaker 1:I am so thrilled to welcome him back to the podcast because he continues to do research that complements all the work that I've done throughout my career.
Speaker 1:When I think about leadership development and all the practices and I think so many of you in my audience have probably gone to trainings that I've done or facilitated and we've connected over the years I focus a lot on what you're doing that is working. What are the practices that good leaders emulate or aspiring leaders could be doing or should be doing, but not necessarily on how are you showing up in terms of who you are and fulfilling your purpose, and thinking about all of how your past affects how you're showing up, and those are some of the things that Ryan has looked at in his research and in his books. So, as we dig into this podcast today, I'm going to reintroduce you to him if you've heard me talk about him or heard him before and I'm so excited to share the work he's doing in becoming better, because it has helped me to become better and it can help you too. So today I want to welcome Ryan to the Intentional Leaders podcast, and we have met before, so welcome back to the show.
Speaker 2:Well, thanks for having me back. We must have done something right the first time, so I appreciate it.
Speaker 1:Cindy, we did. You're my mentor. You, I appreciate it. We did. You're my, you're my mentor. You're, you've been a coach to me. You are a valued author and I just want to soak up all that you have to share and also share with my listeners. So thank you for taking the time out of what I know is a busy schedule for you.
Speaker 2:Oh, no, for sure, I think you forgot something. Can we say, friend, let's do that We'd be friends.
Speaker 1:This is great.
Speaker 2:This is just a couple of friends chatting. This is wonderful, thank you.
Speaker 1:Excellent. So I have behind me, and with me, of course, your books, which I love. I refer to them often, so anyone who's a podcast listener has probably heard me mention you reference your work. But you have done several different mindset books, but your most recent one is what I want to dive into today and it's called Becoming Better, which I love, because who doesn't want to become better? And I want to get a little bit of insight from you about what inspired that, and also of insight from you about what inspired that and also how does it build on the things you've done before in your work. So first, what was the inspiration for Becoming Better?
Speaker 2:Well, it's been a journey, and if you've read these books, you'll kind of get a feel for this journey that I feel like I've been on and I do work, just like you, cindy where I'm helping people to get better, to improve themselves. And the more that I learn about the process of becoming better and the more that I see people do that successfully as well as people who don't do that successfully, what I've really come to learn is that, while I think everybody wants to become better, at least at some level, most people actually don't know how to become better. I think we all know how to incrementally improve, yeah, but really what I'm fascinated with is transformational growth and development. Growth and development and I just feel like I've kind of, because of the work that I've done with my prior two books and the research that surrounds it, I believe that I have a perspective that can really help people to understand how to become transformationally better, and that's what this new book is all about is how we can do that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and which is so powerful? Because you use two very distinct words that mean a lot of different things, you know. One is that there's a process to follow and some people are like, oh, I'd like a good process, but the process and going through it can be transformational. And I think that's the powerful part about it. It's not just do these five things and you're going to be better, but it's the explore these areas of what's working and what's not, and how you're showing up as your best self and when are you not and what do you do about that. And, as always, your journey inspires me because you share so much of yourself in your books, which I think is cool.
Speaker 2:Well, thank you. I mean it's been, yeah, as much of a personal transformation journey as it is with the work that I do and I think in a way to be able to help people to transform. You probably need to do that work yourself, but I find it interesting that you bring up the the most immediate. You'll bring up the idea of a process which which the book does have a process, and I wanted that to be a part of the book. But, but what I also hope that proceeds, a stepping onto that process is an understanding of a different developmental strategy than what we're used to and what we're familiar with, because, ultimately, what we're familiar with and what we're used to when it comes to developing ourselves is, at best, incrementally helpful, and if we want transformational growth, we actually need to introduce a new strategy. Should we jump into that or do you have a question before?
Speaker 1:we do that. No, I think that's you're right and I think that's why I have gobbled up everything you've done is because I've been in the space of if you're talking about vertical development and horizontal development, you know I've been more in the space of teaching people things. So what do you want to add to your toolbox to get better at what you're doing? And your space is more about vertical development and I love that concept and that you've explored it. But for people who aren't familiar with it, what does it mean and why do you think that is so critical?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and let's start. I want to get into that language of horizontal and vertical development, but let's even start maybe a little bit more simply, because what I've learned is that we really have two different sides of ourselves. I mean, just kind of think for yourself. For example and I give these examples in my book of people like, let's say, tiger Woods, ellen DeGeneres, michael Jackson One example that I use in the book is Bobby Knight, a famous basketball coach from Indiana University, and these are people that have been incredibly successful in life, but they're also people that have a rather extreme amount of controversy surrounding them, right, in many ways, all of their careers have been derailed because of that controversy, and so the reason why I give these examples is because they help us to understand we have two different sides of ourselves.
Speaker 2:One side is our doing side. This is our talent, our knowledge, our skills and our abilities, and it's these individuals doing sides that allowed them to reach certain levels of success and popularity. But the controversy associated with each of these individuals had nothing to do with their doing side.
Speaker 2:But it had everything to do with the second side of themselves, which is what I call our being side. And so if we think about an X axis being our doing side and the Y axis being our being side, it helps us to kind of understand that. Look, most of our development efforts historically you think about our education systems, our athletic programs and our organizational development efforts almost entirely focus on our doing side, and that's, to use the way that you said it, which I like the way that you said it. That's like adding tools to our tool belt and that can be helpful, but what we also need to consider is the quality of the person wearing the tool belt.
Speaker 2:Yes, and that's what the being side is all about. And so this is this new developmental strategy that I think we need to consider is we need to? We need to again, not that the doing side development isn't helpful, we need to again. Not that the doing side development isn't helpful, but it's not transformationally helpful. And so if we want that transformation, we've got to change our strategy from focusing on the doing side to focusing on the being side, and so, to tie that into the language that you brought up earlier, horizontal development is improving along our doing side, development is improving along our doing side, and vertical development is this newer kind of more novel developmental approach, which is all about elevating along our being side.
Speaker 1:Yeah, did I describe that? Okay, you described it very well. And I think identifying, you know, figures in the public domain help us to understand that right. It helps to identify, okay, those people are well-known, successful in their own right, in their own profession, with their own expertise. And then what are those qualities and characteristics that have been less effective? Or, put as you said, kind of that there's squishiness to their character, you know, and in all different ways. So I think describing that is helpful and, again, there aren't a lot of ways that we've been able to characterize that. I mean, if you look at leadership theories which you know we're both in the space of leadership development there's all these qualities and characteristics. But that could be. You could fill up pages and pages of all the qualities and characteristics that are going to be essential, but what does that actually mean? What are we supposed to be focusing on? That is the most important and I think that's where your work focuses in on what are some of the areas that can help us to be better. That isn't overwhelming.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you're stepping into one of my biggest pet peeves about the leadership literature and the leadership space, which is I think that there are a lot of really good ideas out there, but we have this tendency to boil it down to like and if you think about, for example, these different characteristics or styles of leadership right, transformational leadership, servant leadership, authentic leadership, responsible leadership right and we tend to boil these down to what do you need to do to?
Speaker 2:be, a transformational leader and we emphasize the do and we don't emphasize the be portion of that and ultimately, and there's my belief is when we become better, we do better, and we just have a tendency, almost because it's I think it's easier, it's more simple, to focus on the just tell me what to do, yes, and that's easier than introspecting about the current quality of our being.
Speaker 2:And that's kind of where in the book I bring up my own story, because awakening to my being was not easy, nor was it fun. But what I've also learned, yeah, is it's easier than I thought it would be and it is actually not as painful as I anticipated. So I'm not going to say that it is easy and it wasn't painful, but it was easier and less painful than I anticipated, and so I hope you know that's. Another kind of takeaway that I want people to have about this journey is it might feel like it's this big mountain we need to climb. And don't get me wrong, it's a big mountain, but it's maybe not mountain we need to climb. And don't get me wrong, it's a big mountain, yeah, but it's maybe not as daunting as we anticipated.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, and you have been my coach in the past and you taught me that too, because I think I want to continue to transform the rest of my life.
Speaker 1:I hope I continue to get better, right and not just do better, be better. And you helped me as a coach to explore some of those areas that I wasn't seeing, or some of those dark side things that I didn't want to look at, or some of the things in the past that have affected me, you know, decades later and in your compassionate, thoughtful, helpful way, allowed me to explore those in a way that it's awkward and uncomfortable, but it also was transformative, you know. So to look at some of the things that you and I talked about and that was last year or the year before, I can't remember, but it had a huge effect on me and I know I am showing up differently. I know I am becoming better because of that. So I want to say you know, going along that transformational journey with you was difficult and slightly awkward and painful, but also very kind of fun and engaging Right, Because you were a great support.
Speaker 2:And you were also a great coachee at the same time.
Speaker 2:Well, and you're also a great coachee at the same time, and one of the things that I learned from my experience coaching you is, of course, you had done development up until the time that we started to work together, and so in a way, I've kind of learned and of course I've learned this for myself is we're onions, we have layers, and really our ongoing development is about peeling back the layers, and what I just felt with you is you had already peeled back a whole bunch of layers and I felt like and I was honored to kind of play a role of being somebody to help you peel some of those next layers.
Speaker 2:And I think each time we peel off these layers, it is transformational, but it always always involves a deepening of our awareness, it involves a new awakening, and oftentimes I'll talk about this new awakening as being an inflection point that we are inevitably different and our trajectory is different when we engage in this deeper level of awakening. And so that's really the first step of the becoming better journey is awakening. That's the first step of the process that you kind of mentioned earlier.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love that. So then talk a little bit about vertical development and why that's so important. So again, horizontal development is the doing side. How to do better, how does vertical development help the being side of us?
Speaker 2:But yeah. So I think one of the things that's helpful to understand to be able to really value or see the importance of vertical development. So we need to understand that our, what exactly our being side is. So our being side at a foundational level is the quality and sophistication of our body's internal operating system, literally our nervous system. How is our body wired to operate? And we all have our own programming, whether we realize it or not.
Speaker 2:So, for example, if you get constructive criticism from somebody, do you have an automatic knee-jerk reaction to that constructive criticism? Well, most people do, and that's defensiveness and that's built into our internal operating system. It's not a conscious choice that we make to become defensive. It's our body's natural reaction to that particular circumstance and that's driven by the quality of our body's internal operating system or nervous system. And so when we understand that our being side is about the programming involved in our body's nervous system, the programming involved in our body's nervous system, then it helps us to understand that vertical development is about upgrading our internal operating system so that when we encounter tricky, difficult, complex, uncertain circumstances, our body doesn't move towards self-protective tendencies like that's what defensiveness is when we receive constructive criticism. It's a self-protection mechanism that holds us back from long-term value creation.
Speaker 2:And so what vertical development allows us to do is to refine our body's internal operating system so that when we're in these challenging situations, we don't move towards self-protection, we move instead to what I call value creation, which generally means that we create space for some of the kind of discomfort in the short term to create value in the long term.
Speaker 2:So to just kind of hopefully bring this to life is when we receive constructive criticism. Yes, we can get defensive and that's self-protective in the moment. It protects our emotions right now. But a more value-creating response to constructive criticism is to actually sit with the discomfort of receiving that constructive criticism doesn't mean we have to agree with it, but if we could sit with that discomfort, create space to ask the question is there something here that I could benefit from Then that allows us to move into value creation mode, which is I am now in a position to improve myself so that I can create greater value in the future. Because if I immediately get defensive, no growth will ever occur. I will not become a better value creator by getting defensive. I only become a better value creator by creating space for that short-term discomfort so that I could be this long-term value creator.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, that's a great example and that's an area you're getting also at growth mindset. You know the ability fixed mindset is I'm protecting myself for the fear of not knowing something or doing something right to the growth orientation of. Of course. I want to grow and get better and add value, and that was, those were some of the triggers. For me was that fixed mindset dimension, that that you have talked about in your books and whatnot.
Speaker 1:But my, my, my body has rewired because of that, you know. So, for me, at this point, when someone gives me feedback and there's comments and suggestions, I don't feel that anymore. I don't feel it. I'm open to it, like, yeah, what do you got? How can I get better? You know, if I don't, you know, I want to know and I'm able to sit with it, as you said. And is it uncomfortable? Well, of course it is, but that doesn't trigger the same defensiveness that in me. I used to feel like you know you could physically like this. This means something bad about me, right, I was giving it more power than it needed to have for a lot of different reasons. So I think that's a great, a great example.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, and I appreciate you sharing Right, because even in sharing that example, I think I imagine, if you're listening to this, you can sense that here's a place where Cindy has changed and upgraded her automatic programming.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:Right, and then what that feels like to me here's a word that I like to use is that your programming, over time, as it relates to this, has grown more sophisticated. Yeah, and that's what becoming better is all about. It's really about helping our body's internal operating system to operate at a higher and more sophisticated level, and I think let me just put some terminology that just might be helpful right, it's like moving from seeing the world in white and black to seeing it in the spectrum of the rainbow. It's like moving from being a dependent thinker to being an independent thinker, to being an interdependent thinker. It's our ability to move from simplicity to complexity, or having a more narrow window of tolerance to a wider window of tolerance. All of these things are just different ways that we can categorize growth along our being side.
Speaker 1:Yeah, which is wonderful and so powerful because, as you talked about the onions, because, as you talked about the onions, we're all onions but the layers have been there and been created over time and they become more.
Speaker 1:You know, our wiring is the way it is because of things in our past and you talk in your book about in I think all three of your books about a little bit about trauma and how that has shaped, shapes us, or things like ADHD and how that shapes people, the way they're showing up. But I think it's so, it's so energizing and hopeful to know that one can change themselves. You know I'm in decades way, way into more decades than you've had but to be able to say I have literally changed my internal operating system and the way I react to things in a different way feels so powerful. And you're right, it's not just that internal feeling, but then I show up differently to add different value and more value to situations that I'm in, because I'm not reacting in a way that's affecting the situation or other people in a way that didn't feel good to me or to them, right? So I think that's pretty cool.
Speaker 2:Well, let me build off of that, because I do think that there's a beautiful message that comes from exactly what you're saying as it relates to this. But what we've learned in terms of research on trauma is that the more trauma one experiences, the more their body becomes wired for self-protection. It's our body's natural defensive mechanisms that arise, and I think that that makes sense, right. The more pain and trauma we've experienced, the more self-protective we're going to become, and that's our body's survival strategy, but it's also an inhibiting strategy when it comes to becoming the people that we want to become. I've heard it phrased this way, which I like the wiring that we needed to survive our childhood is not the same wiring that we need to be effective as a parent, as an adult, as a spouse, as a leader as a fill in the blank and so if we want that, we've got to change our wiring.
Speaker 2:And here's the reality 70% of adults at least 70% of adults have experienced trauma to the degree that it has caused their body to become more wired for self-protection.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's amazing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it is amazing. And I think what I love about that messaging and how you include that research is there's nothing to be ashamed of, you know, like there's no shame in looking back and experiencing things and recalling things that shape us to where we are today, and looking back at those things not with judgment or shame, but with understanding and awareness, with judgment or shame, but with understanding and awareness. And oh, okay, and that's how I looked at you know, for me that fixed and growth mindset is education in my family was number one. You worked hard, you got good grades, you did this thing and we had to prove our smarts, you know, and that was a part of our why. And if we didn't, we got punished for that.
Speaker 1:And again, I'm not saying that anything bad about my parents. They valued that very much in our family and we all dutifully went to college and got our master's degrees and did all the things Right. But that created a lot of reactions to challenges to my competence or to my intelligence or how I felt about it. So I love the way that you frame it, because it isn't. It's about exploring all that and being open to looking at it honestly, right.
Speaker 2:And I think that mindsets is one lens of many that we could take it at evaluating our being side. And that's where and you've had some experience using this with some of your clients of my mindset assessment, which looks at four different sets of mindsets that range along this continuum from self-protection to value creation, and I've had over 50,000 people take this mindset assessment, and what I've learned is only 2.5% are in the top quartile for all four of these sets of mindsets, and so what that says is that most of us have some self-protective wiring, and if we can awaken to that and do something about it, then we can become better, and so that's one of the reasons why I think mindsets is such a helpful lens to kind of do this being side work. It's surely not the only way, but I think that there's some helpful frameworks, some language and then also some developmental strategies that are incredibly transformational.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you bet, and I think the work as we've been partnering, or I've been utilizing your mindset assessment with a variety of clients, it is an awakening. And sometimes it's a rude awakening like, oh boy, you know people don't like their results, like well, that can't be true. And I, especially like you, get that too. Oh yeah, like in the open and closed mindedness they're not like this can't be right. I can't be closed minded. I'm like all right, right now what's happening with your body? You know, right now you're kind of doing that.
Speaker 2:They kind of reveal their hand a little bit, right? Well, let me tell you this story just because I think it's so comical. So at the time I was really stressed out about it, but in hindsight now I can laugh at it. So I was doing work with a group and I had the group I'll take my mindset assessment in advance. And I went to because of what I'll do when I work with the groups and I've done this with you is we'll compile a collective mindset report. And so I had gotten everybody from the group except for the leader, the person who was bringing me in to work with the group.
Speaker 2:So literally the night before the workshop, I send an email over to the leader and I say hey, I haven't seen your results come through, can you quickly take this mindset assessment? And so she takes it and I get this email, and it's in the evening. I get this email from her. Says I cannot believe my results. This assessment is garbage. I can like. It is incredibly wrong. Um, and here here's what it says about me, and I couldn't disagree. More is her language.
Speaker 2:And she said I think I'm going to let you still come in tomorrow and talk to my group because I think they could benefit from it, but I don't think I'm going to be there. And so I get this and clearly she's hot and I'm thinking, oh my goodness, this is a train wreck. And so I just said, okay, it's evening time, I'm just going to let this sit overnight and I'll touch base with her in the morning. And so I just let it sit and so, but I was kind of like stewing about it like that night, what am I going to do tomorrow? Like what's going to play out here?
Speaker 2:And so I wake up and I get down to my desk, I open up my email and I find an email is in there for her. So I'm a little bit anxious about clicking on this email. So I click on this email and I came in at like 1 am or something like that, and she says I apologize for my previous email. I'm like, oh, okay, this is good. And then she says, after talking it over with my husband, I think it would be good for me to be a part of the workshop today. I was like, oh my goodness, this is golden.
Speaker 2:So yeah workshop today, I was like, oh my goodness, this is golden. So yeah, so it's not uncommon for people to get pretty reactive when we start to investigate these really deep parts of our being, which is our mindset.
Speaker 1:So yeah, thank you for sharing that. That makes me feel better. I've had some similar reactions to people that are just obstinate about like I don't do that, and when you say, hey, this is your wiring, this is subconscious, you aren't really aware You're not doing it on purpose, right, you're not being closed-minded on purpose, but when do you show up that way? When are those moments? And helping people understand the importance of that can be challenging. But, yeah, that defensiveness right away. But that's part of the journey, right, are you willing to look at that discomfort and try to understand it, and are you willing to explore it? So I thank you for sharing that.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Well, you might find this interesting. So if I were to ask if we had a group of 100 leaders in front of us and we kind of said well, you can have either more of a fixed mindset or you can have either, or more of a growth mindset, how many of you out of you 100 leaders think have a fixed mindset? Do you think we would get anybody who raises their hand no, Everybody in the room thinks that mindset than a growth mindset, yeah. And so that just kind of speaks to why.
Speaker 2:It doesn't mean that they haven't learned and grown in their life they surely have. That doesn't mean that they haven't learned and grown in their life they surely have. But what that means is their body carries around fears of looking good or looking bad and failing. And so when we have that fixed mindset, these leaders have a tendency to hold on to what's worked in the past and not embrace what might work better in the future. And so what I find is that most organizations are run by fixed minded leaders. And when organizations are run by fixed minded leaders, they tend to be kind of slower adopters and they're generally kind of struggling. They're holding on to the past, so they're laggards in their marketplace.
Speaker 2:And ultimately that's holding them back and they're not, to your point, conscious of it yet. But if we can help them to become conscious, then we could do something about it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, for sure, for sure, and you're the right one to do that. Well, when you look at the becoming better and you've done a great job of describing, like, what this means so not the doing, the being side and when you think of this, this is you know the subtitle is the groundbreaking science of personal transformation. So this isn't just about leadership, it's about your life. But when it comes to leadership and someone reading this book through that lens, what myths do you hope to dispel or to reframe with this book when it comes to leaders who would be reading it?
Speaker 2:Well, I just recognize that if our only developmental strategy that we're aware of is the doing side, then generally that means that to be to do better, they've got to push, push harder, work harder, gain new knowledge, gain new skills, gain new experience. And I'm not going to say that those things aren't helpful or can be helpful, but they don't move the needle on the being side. So the myth that I kind of want to break is that to become better, it's not about pushing harder, it's actually about shifting gears, and that's something that a lot of leaders really struggle with. If you're familiar with driving a manual transmission, the kind of analogy that I use is most leaders get stuck in fourth gear, and fourth gear is great because at fourth gear you can go really fast. And even when you're going fast, the RPMs are climbing in fourth gear and the car. You could feel the speed, yeah, and most leaders get addicted to that speed. Yes and so, but what I try to help leaders do is to shift out of fourth gear and let's get them into fifth gear, because at fifth gear what happens is the RPMs drop down. So it actually is easier to go fast and we can go faster.
Speaker 2:But here's the challenge about getting leaders to shift gears. Unless you're a power shifter, the first step that you need to take in order to shift gears is to pull your foot off of the gas. Well, what leader you know? If I go to any leader and say, hey, the first thing you need to do is put your foot off the gas and they're going to be like you're crazy, right, I can't. It's by pushing on the gas that we make progress.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it's. Yes in the short term. Yeah, right, and that's. And so that's ultimately the shift when I'm working with leaders that I want to help them to make is to shift from that fourth gear mentality into that fifth gear mentality, and it corresponds. There's some research that backs up how those mentalities are different and that's fun to dive into. But that's up how those mentalities are different and that's fun to dive into. But that's, I think, ultimately the myth. And I think, along with that, I'll just add I mean, if we think about the doing side on the X axis and the being side on the Y axis, where we find most leaders is high doing, low being Well, why is?
Speaker 2:that? Well, it's because who do we promote into leadership roles? It's people who can get stuff done, that are talented along their doing side, but that doesn't say anything about their being side. And so, ultimately, I think you're and I are our collective challenge being in the leadership development spaces. How do we move these leaders from high doing low being to high doing, high being? And if we could do that, then that's where transformation occurs, not only for the individual, but for the groups and the organizations that they lead.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. And what a great opportunity and simultaneously a tremendous challenge to get people to you know again, the gas example is a good one, like take your foot off the gas. There's how much fear is there in that and people have gotten to where they've gotten because they've done certain things that have made them successful. So now I've been reinforced for decades potentially about the things that I've done, and now I've been reinforced for decades potentially about the things that I've done. And now we're saying, all right, think differently, do you know? Be different. And there's a lot of inherent, of course, resistance to that because you've been reinforced and rewarded for how you've shown up thus far. So when you think about I know that you've talked about leaders that have been more transformational, who are in that quadrant of doing and being that you see as exceptional, and can you share an example of that so people get a sense? Because you gave some great examples of high doing, low being. Who is in that box of high being, high doing, from your perspective?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'll rattle off maybe multiple examples, but let me start with one that I think is just. It really is, in my mind, the clearest contrast of this. So let's step into Microsoft. So Microsoft was led by Steve Ballmer from 2000 to 2014. And he's a high doing, low being leader from everything that I've studied, and he was one of these leaders that's kind of push hard, go hard, right. He's stuck in fourth gear and Microsoft's stock price stayed the same during his tenure.
Speaker 2:Well, in 2014, they promote Satya Nadella into the CEO role and Satya Nadella, in my mind, is very much a high-being, high-doing leader and the effect of this is transformational. And since we were talking about pulling your foot off of the gas, I mean get this, satya Nadella. He said a few things in his book Hit Refresh that signal kind of his more elevated leadership. He said one the C in CEO stands for curator of culture. And the second thing and this is evidence of his willingness to take his foot off of the gas in the short term to get the organization into fifth gear is, he said, for my first year, my most important job is to listen. I mean that is not moving forward at all.
Speaker 2:Right that listening feels more like stagnation, at least in the short term. But here's the reason why he said it. He says I know that I need to listen because that's going to set the foundation for my leadership for the years to come. And ultimately, what that did his listening is it brought about a renewed and clear purpose statement for the company that the company can now rally around and that set the strategy and the trajectory for the organization. So in the 11 years that Satya Nadella has been CEO, microsoft stock price is up I think eight, nine times from what it was when he took over, and that's the transformative effect of having a more elevated leader in an organization. I think it also kind of has that cool example of literally slowing down to speed up, and it takes a really vertically developed leader to do that. So I think that that's a great example.
Speaker 2:Let me rattle off some more, just really quickly, and we can dive into anything you want to add on these. But I would add in and these are related to there's books connected to each of these leaders that are really effective. So I think there's Ed Catmull with Pixar. He wrote a book called Creativity Inc. I really like Bob Iger's book Right of a Lifetime about his leadership at Disney. There's no Rules Rules, that's about Netflix. Reed Hastings and Aaron Meyer wrote that Alan Mulally, to me, is a high-being, high-doing leader, and he's featured in the book American Icon. You also have other leaders, like Indra Nooyi at PepsiCo, mary Barrett at GM, even political leaders you can, of course, go back and study Gandhi, nelson Mandela, martin Luther King, but even some current leaders like Jacinda Ardern are relatively current, and Angela Merkel, former chancellor of Germany. So those are, anyways, just some examples that I commonly revert back to.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, and that's super helpful to be able to like what does that look like? And just to be able to compare and contrast. And Satyam and Nadella, nadella, right, is that how I'm saying it? Right? I watched a couple of video clips on him and and it was really interesting because you could just feel the sense of purpose and calm and how he talked. His sense of just it, almost his energy, came off in a video. I was like, dude, I'd love to meet this you and spend some time with you and just get some of that energy and purpose and calm.
Speaker 1:And, as you said, I guess I'm not surprised Like I'm going to listen for a year. And the focus on the culture, too, is a very long term strategy, and I think that's part of I can't take my gas off the pedal because what's going to happen in the short term? That's going to be bad, you know, and everything's too urgent and important which it really isn't to be able to step back and reflect in order to do something better and become better, and I think there's a big trade-off there that a lot of people just aren't willing to make. And he was and, as you said, the effect was profound, but I loved listening to him and said the effect was profound.
Speaker 2:But I loved listening to him and I'm going to check out some of the other books that you mentioned too, yeah, and I would also say, look up some videos with Steve Ballmer, because you'll get a very different reaction. Right, you're going to see somebody who's very high strung, whereas Satya Nadella seems this like calm, cool, collected and, to your point, purposeful and intentional, whereas Steve Ballmer feels like a very reactive individual. I mean, he's now the owner of the Clippers and you could see that on the sideline if you kind of see him there. So, yeah, I think that that's. That's why part of why I brought up that example is the contrast is so stark there.
Speaker 1:Yes, absolutely. And the results are. You know, there's some metrics for success too. So when you think about all of this and again, I would encourage people not only just to get the Becoming, better book, but I think you know the Elevated Leader and Success Mindsets for me set the foundation for this book to be even more powerful. And I told you I read it like a night. I was just like, yeah, stop talking to me, everybody, I gotta read Brian's book. But when you think about this journey for people and what is one small step Like, again, I want people to follow you. I want people to read your books because they have helped me. I've recommended them a lot and I believe in all the research and work that you're doing. But what is one small thing that people can do right now that would help them to be better?
Speaker 2:Yeah, Well, if it's okay, I'm going to give you more than one small step. Let me paint, because you brought up the process earlier. Let me just try to paint that process at a really high level. So what I've learned is that the process of becoming better is first learning about our being side and understanding what that is and the role that it plays in how we operate. The second step is we've got to awaken to the quality or altitude of our being side, and that's where these assessments, like the mindset assessment, come in. And then the third step is to do the work of elevating, and so that's essentially the three parts of my new book, becoming Better.
Speaker 2:I walk people through those three different parts, and so, as it relates to that third part, those three different parts, and so, as it relates to that third part, actually doing the steps to vertically develop or to elevate along our being side, as I break down the steps or ways that we can think about it into surface level strategies, deeper level strategies and deepest level strategies. So, at the surface, these are strategies that are connected to improving and regulating our body's nervous system. These are things like meditation, yoga, journaling, even cold plunging, are things that help us to refine our body's nervous system, and these are largely daily habits and I think these are the places to start. So for anybody, I think that that's again it's a different developmental strategy and tactic. We've got to focus on refining our body's nervous system, and those are some surface level strategies. The deeper level strategies is we've talked about mindset. This is where mindset work fits.
Speaker 2:For me, it's a deeper level strategy, and the deepest level is when we start to get into really therapeutic approaches to help us heal our minds, our bodies and our hearts. And for some of us and for me, as I've peeled back the layers, I've learned that I needed some therapeutic support in my journey and that rapidly accelerated my vertical development journey, and so I know that there's people that are out there, like me, who have some trauma in their past and that plays a role in how they show up in the world. I also feature in my book an example of my wife, somebody who has been impacted by ADHD and that's something that impacts our body's internal operating system, and so she's somebody that's engaged in what's called neurofeedback therapy and it's proved to be life-changing for her. So those are some of the deepest level strategies there. So that was more than what you asked for, but is that.
Speaker 1:Okay, do you want to dive into any of that? More is better. Well, and when you talked about your wife's journey too because I know a fair amount of people who who have ADHD, and I love again the way you're looking at it is like, okay, this is wiring, there's something here to explore, and that there are ways to to to think about that differently and experience it differently. And the therapy that your wife went through and experienced was something that I had read about and I was like this is really intriguing, but who's done this? You know, does it work? And it's really awesome to know that it had an effect on her in a positive way.
Speaker 1:And for you, therapy too. You know, I've gone to therapy in different points in my life and it hasn't always been as maybe transformational as it might be actually right now. You know, interestingly, it would be more like I'm having a crisis I need someone to talk to. Let's go do this. As opposed to now. It would be more about how has my experience in my life shaped to where I am today? And I want to explore that with someone and make meaning of it so I can continue to evolve and become better. So I think the.
Speaker 2:You know, therapy means different things for different people, and anyway, I just think that's the purpose of the therapy, the modality of the therapy and the quality of the therapist surely all play an important role?
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely. Well, I want people to take action like get out there to Amazon, y'all, get this book, read the book, read all the books, do all the work, because I know it matters. It's going to make a difference in the quality of what we're able to contribute to the universe and, at the end of the day, you know, that to me, is what becoming better is is that I am living a life that has meaning, significance, purpose, and that I'm willing to show up every day getting better at that Right, better at that right. And we're never all going to get it perfect, and it's not about perfection and it's not about that, but it's about consistently knowing that we can become better and that that matters to us and other people around us. So I just really appreciate all the work that you've done to make that clear and meaningful and relevant and to be able to do the work to get there. So, thank you. I appreciate you creating this platform for us to have this conversation and share with others.
Speaker 2:I know it's not easy and it's probably a lot of the time. I'm sure you probably consider it to be rather thankless, but really appreciate you creating this space for us to have a conversation like this.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but I think the times that I show up differently and I've thought about that in the last few weeks, some challenges that I get in classes or coaching people and whatnot, and how I show up during those challenges and that's the value that I'm bringing differently and they don't know that I'm doing something different or reacting different or that my body feels different, but I know and the outcome is better. You know it's better for them, it's better for me, and so the becoming better. You're right in a way. What's the thanks you get? But there is thanks in the ability to do the work that we want to do and show up as our best selves. So I love that.
Speaker 2:And of course I'm biased. I like the cover of my new book, but you know I tried to be intentional with the light bulbs because I feel like exactly what you're describing is I feel like I'm a brighter light to the world around me because I have become better, and that's ultimately what I want for any reader of this book is. I want that. I want it to help them become a brighter light within their spheres of influence.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that is a great. I guess I kind of noticed that and I kind of didn't now that I'm looking at it. So thank you for being a bright light in my life, and what I hope for all my listeners is that you become a beacon of brightness for them too, and of hope that you can do this right, that any of us can do that. With time, patience, effort and awareness, we can all become that bright light that we want to be, and you give me hope for that journey, not just for us, but for others as well. So thank you for that.
Speaker 2:Oh no, thank you, and that means a lot. So thank you, and I guess maybe, before we leave, I'll offer this up because you're such a great friend and great supporter is, if you're somebody who's listening to this and you find value in it, if you go and get my book or if you go and take one of my assessments, please reach out to me, and if you want to chat through your assessment results or talk about the book, I'd be more than happy to connect with you. So that's, I'll offer that up to your listeners here, cindy.
Speaker 1:Thank you and I hope people take you up on that because, hey, listeners do that. It will be again. You're a supportive, wonderful, gracious coach. You really are. So for anyone out there who wants that experience in a safe, psychologically safe, comfortable environment that helps you to feel good about where you are and where you want to get to connect with Ryan, please, please, please, take him up on the offer. So thank you for that, Ryan. Thank you for your time today. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, this has been great.
Speaker 1:Yeah, this has been great, wasn't that cool? He's had such an effect on not just the work I do, but on me. He's a great coach, and the fact that he offered y'all to follow up with him and have a conversation about your mindset assessment I'd be like jumping on that. So if you are interested in becoming better which I know every one of you are, because you wouldn't be listening to a podcast about leadership if you weren't interested in continuing to evolve yourself and chances are there's a lot of things that you're working on from a development perspective that will help you to do things better, and that is important, right To be able to be more efficient, be more effective, do things that help you connect with others and continue on that leadership journey. And then there's the who are you at your core and who are you becoming, and what does that whole journey look like and sound like for you?
Speaker 1:Because that journey is different for all of us, but what I know is, if you are interested in his work and you follow, even signing up for his newsletters they're very informative. I always take something away. He's really great at sharing resources and TED Talks all the things. So please, please, please, connect with him if you haven't taken the mindset assessment, and I know many of you have, because I do. I have started building that into a lot of my programs. But if you have not follow him, take the assessment and it will help you to become better.