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💥 Ignite your company culture with the Build a Vibrant Culture podcast!
We bring together incredible leaders, trailblazing entrepreneurs, and expert visionaries to share the secrets to their success, explore real-world challenges, and reveal what it truly takes to lead with energy, passion, and purpose as a 🌟VIBRANT🌟 Leader.
🎧 Tune in every week as Nicole Greer dives deep with a new inspiring guest, delivering fresh insights and actionable wisdom to elevate your leadership game!
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[00:00:00] Announcer: This is the Build A Vibrant Culture Podcast, your source for the strategies, systems, and smarts you need to turn possibility into purpose. Every week we dive into dynamic conversations as our host, Nicole Greer, interviews leadership and business experts. They're here to shed light on practical solutions to the challenges of personal and professional development. Now, here's your host, a professional speaker, coach and consultant, Nicole Greer.
[00:00:32] Nicole Greer: Welcome everybody to the Build A Vibrant Culture podcast. My name is Nicole Greer and they call me The Vibrant Coach, and I am here with another amazing guest and I have my brother from another mother, Mr. Greg Smith. He and I are madly in love with this idea of executive coaching, and we know how it can help people. Let me tell you a little bit about Greg.
[00:00:52] Greg brings over 25 years of extensive experience managing large comprehensive leadership and assessment client engagements. These include global leadership succession, high potential development, executive coaching, executive team effectiveness and acceleration initiatives.
[00:01:10] Greg serves as general manager for Franklin Covey's executive coaching practice where the coaching success rate-- please don't miss this-- exceeds 97%. Greg has held leadership roles in human resources, business development and consulting. He provides unique insights to leaders and their talent partners. Greg's client relationships have included Walmart, Deloitte, International Paper, Starbucks, --I could use a Starbucks right about now-- FedEx, Robert Half, Walt Disney, Abbott, AbbVie, Dollar General Stores, and many others across all industries. Greg holds a master's degree in Industrial Organizational Psychology from the University of Tulsa, and Greg is also a contributing writer for Forbes Coaches Council, and he's a nice guy. Please welcome to the show, Greg. Hi.
[00:02:00] Greg Smith: Good morning. You're very kind. Thanks for having me.
[00:02:02] Nicole Greer: Yeah, I'm excited to have you here. So, tell me a little bit about how coaching impacts culture. You know, we're all here trying to learn how to build a vibrant culture. So what role? I think I know, but I want your take on it. How do you build a vibrant culture through coaching?
[00:02:18] Greg Smith: Yeah. Oh goodness. Oh man. So many things all at once, Nicole. So I think leaders are charged with, leaders have the responsibility for building and/or sustaining the culture. When I joined Franklin Covey, I joined as part of the coaching practice. It had a unique culture. Franklin Covey has a very deep culture. As we integrated the two, I needed to learn and embrace all the cultural imperatives and things that are so near and dear to who Franklin Covey is and how we deliver to our customers. So I needed to recognize my role in owning that and living that and bringing that to life, breathing that myself.
[00:02:53] And so much of that is seven habits, deep, deep in, in Dr. Covey's work. Deep deep in who Franklin Covey is. So it's just, it's the recognition of who is the culture? What is the culture? How do I eat, drink, and sleep it? How do I bring it to life and support and sustain it? So coaching is just one way of helping leaders unleash additional greatness in themselves, in the context of the culture that they find themselves in day to day.
[00:03:16] Nicole Greer: Yeah. And I love that you went straight for the Seven Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey. All right, so friends, please, if you are listening and you heard that title, please go put it in your Amazon cart immediately because this is a classic, this is an absolute classic. And then I double dog dare you to go over to YouTube and put in Stephen Covey videos seven Habits and see what you can find. Stephen Covey's popped off the planet now. We miss him terrible! But I mean, great stuff. And what you said in your answer to the question is we begin to live it out. Yeah. And so I think culture is about how people live within the workplace. Yeah. What are your thoughts on that?
[00:03:56] Greg Smith: Yeah I fully agree and I think, you know, again, relative to coaching, Nicole, is a significant portion of the coaching we do is what we would call transition coaching. Others call it maybe onboarding coaching, but it's when you hire or promote leaders into the organization, either up to a certain level or in from outside the organization. Part of the mission is helping that leader understand the culture and navigate it in an effective and positive way, versus stumbling across the landmines where I'm not I'm running counter to the culture. How do we proactively help them identify what are those key components of being successful and living and drinking and sleeping the culture of the organization you've just joined, or you've just moved to a new level. And recognizing how do I live in congruence with those?
[00:04:43] Nicole Greer: Yeah. Fantastic. All right, so, Greg, you were talking about the fact that coaching can kind of set people up for success in their role as a leader. And one of the statistics that you have on your LinkedIn is that, you know, a lot of people fail when they're first promoted because they're not prepped, they're not ready. They haven't had a coach that's like, these are the sit ups you need to do. These are the laps you need to do in order to be successful in your new role as a leader. So we've got to make sure people invest in this, but I'm curious about you personally. How did you step into the world of coaching? What sparked your passion for it?
[00:05:16] Greg Smith: Oh, wow. I love that, Nicole. Thank you.
[00:05:18] Nicole Greer: Yeah, you're welcome.
[00:05:19] Greg Smith: Goodness. I think I've been very fortunate in my career that there were big seasons of what focus or what solutions I was supporting clients with. And there was a massive season of super high volume pre-hire assessment. So I get deep and steeped in all things assessment and effective selections.
[00:05:35] Then there was a season of broad leadership training and development at all levels in the organization. And then again, it was a client engagement where we want a new global remit for an organization's executive assessment globally, which meant a effective executives period. Executive onboarding, executive team effectiveness and coaching. And that, around 2008 just pulled me into that space on leveraging assessments, onboarding, coaching, kind of that holistic ecosystem around executives and helping them be successful. And something just sparked in me with, you know, the background in IO Psych. How are we leveraging, you know, the profession of coaching, the insights from assessments, effective leadership principles that are timeless in a cohesive way to just spark something new. And how are we helping leaders do their jobs? And they've been successful and they've risen up, how are we unlocking that next level of effectiveness and greatness in them?
[00:06:28] Nicole Greer: Ah, that's right. And I love what you're saying. How do we unlock that effectiveness in them? So, you know, here's what I believe, Greg. I just think people have so much untapped potential. It is crazy. Like we don't even know what we're capable of, if we could slow down. And the thing about assessments, 'cause you me keep mentioning assessments, is that like leaders need to look in the mirror.
[00:06:49] Greg I, in your intro we talked about your master's degree. I got a similar degree from Queens University. And I had to take Executive Coaching as part of my program. And before that I had taken a life coaching course and fell in love with coaching then, but then this executive coaching sealed the deal for me.
[00:07:06] Listen to this question that my professor, Catherine, gave us. She said, "Here's the question we ask leaders in executive coaching to begin." And we're all like on pins and needles. And she says, "What is it like to experience you?"
[00:07:22] Greg Smith: Oh,
[00:07:23] Nicole Greer: I know. Is that so good? Thank you Catherine. And so, I mean, that's the first question I ask. And you know, and really Greg, it stumps people. They're like, oh, I never really thought about that. And I'm like, well, it's high time you did. And and these assessments help leaders to kind of take a look in a mirror. What kind of assessments do you suggest for leaders to take? What's the process for giving a leader an assessment? Where do you start?
[00:07:48] Greg Smith: Yeah. I love it. First is I'll go where you were is recognizing like in my head and heart, I need a different view of myself. How am I showing up? If I get promoted from director or whatever to VP or Senior VP, suddenly those little letters in front of my name have people look at me differently, perceive me differently. I'll go to the world of sales. If I've been a an effective sales executive, sales leader, I'm known for knowing everything that moves about my client. Following the sales process. How am I advancing clients in X, Y, Z? I'm the sales expert. As I move to sales leadership, that helps me. But when I move to a certain level in the organization, now people all of a sudden go, gosh, why are you in my business? Why are you micromanaging me? Why don't you like do your job up there? They perceive me differently. And so I think it's recognizing I need to pause and I need to look at myself, just as your professor said, how do, how are people experiencing me? And I think two, two buckets of data, if you will, give us a whole person read on how is Nicole showing up? How's Greg showing up?
[00:08:45] Nicole Greer: I want to the two buckets.
[00:08:47] Greg Smith: Yeah. Oh, you see, yeah. Behavioral data, number one. So if I'm a leader in role and I want to just have good trusting conversations with people, seek that data. If there are those foundational times when it makes sense, you know, around performance or promotions or coaching and growth and development, 360s. I'm a big fan of the interview-based 360s, so I've got a moment to talk with you live. And really drill in and say, oh gosh, you said, when you experienced Greg at great times, at his best, it's this, well, tell me more. Give me a specific example. Well, as you think about when you've experienced Greg and he wasn't at his best or something that suboptimized him, give me more specifics. Give me an example. What, what happened, what was going on? What did he do versus, oh, here, rate Greg on all these 12 competencies and all these behaviors help me get something very real and tangible. So that tells me how I'm showing up, how people are perceiving me. I love a good psychometric, a personality assessment, and there are throngs of them out there, right? Yes. And take your pick. There, there are others I'm more fan of at the executive level that give us deeper insights about the individual, what helps me thrive and survive and be successful in normal times of operating. What are the things that might impact-- emphasis on might-- these personality. These are wirings, these are tendencies. So it's not absolutes, but how am I likely to show up under times of pressure, stress, uncertainty, extra pressure and visibility when the spotlight hits me. And we used to say pre-pandemic, in those times of pressure, uncertainty, volatility, blah, blah, blah. Since the pandemic, so many leaders are operating in constant derailer mode. The pressure never stops. The light is on, like the record button is hit and I'm under that stress. So how am I likely to behave in those stressful times? And then maybe even a third lens is deep, deep down what gets Nicole out of bed in the morning? What is it about creating a vibrant culture that really gets her excited? What gets her juices flowing? That lead into how I show up. So when I look at your personality, your tendencies, your wiring compared to how are you showing up day to day, the behavior rules. How do I marry those two together to get insights about what's the playbook that you're using currently and what's helping you? What about that playbook might be sub-optimizing your best of intentions or outright derailing you? And then when I look forward into your new context, 'cause so often we're looking at leaders in a new role, broader remit, global capability. What is it about 'You are new,' where the playbook that you've used so successfully doesn't work anymore or as effectively, or maybe there's chapters or pages you've got to rip out. We've got to write new pages. So how do I use assessments to inform a heightened self-awareness? So all that diatribe is about how do I raise my self-awareness about who I am, how I show up, how others experience me, and what's going to optimize you. You mentioned, I think you said, you know, the hidden talents. Hidden capabilities.
[00:11:35] Nicole Greer: Yeah. That potential is just sitting there.
[00:11:38] Greg Smith: Yes.
[00:11:38] Nicole Greer: Yeah. And I think too you know, there's a book by Marshall Goldsmith and all of my coachy people listening, you know that book. It's called What Got You Here Won't Get You There. I'm, as you're talking about these people getting promoted to a higher level of leadership. I mean, it's absolutely true. You've got to come up with new skills. The skills that you've used got you to the promotion, and now you need a whole new set of skills. And that's where the coach comes in, I think. I think that's absolutely essential. And you know, when you're talking about assessments, Greg, you said, kind of take your pick. You had some favorites. I'll just share a story and then I'd love to hear a story from you. I just recently worked with 25 executives in a financial firm and over the course of nine, a nine day kind of intensive for the year, I had them take three assessments and just so you guys can kind of hear about it, one was the DiSC okay.
[00:12:29] But it had a emotional intelligence mindset piece to it. So, you know, when you're talking about stress and pre pandemic and post pandemic and how things aren't, foot's not off the gas yet. That was really helpful to them. And so they had like a space of time to absorb that and to be coached around that.
[00:12:46] And then the second thing is they looked at the quality of their character. What?! You're going to look at the quality of my character? Yeah. We're going to use the Tilt. And then finally we used StrengthsFinder. So, you know, I love them all. They just show us a different kind of facet of what it's like to experience us. And they, I think a lot of them really woke up. They're like, oh, okay. I'm unique. And I think the big payoff, Greg, is too, is they realize everybody on my team also has these things. That's the big one. Yeah. So what about you? What about assessments and you, what do you guys use and what, do you have a story of how it helped people?
[00:13:21] Greg Smith: Yeah, I, and again, like you, I'm a rabid fan of assessments. The right assessments at the right level of leader or individual contributor and for the right purpose. Am I talking about Nicole's executive greatness and leadership greatness? Am I thinking about Nicole and her team and how the team operates? So I'll use that to zoom into what we use and find the most value in is the Hogan Leadership series.
[00:13:40] Nicole Greer: Yeah.
[00:13:42] Greg Smith: I was fortunate to study with the Hogans in grad school and so early on got a big sip of the juice. But the there's no better word for me that the profound depth of insights we receive when we can get someone to complete the Hogans and sit with a good qualified coach and look through those tendencies and wirings and, like you shared, a story. I had one organization I was working with in Northern California, an auto insurance organization. And over the course of a lot of work we were doing, I had Hogan data on their entire executive team. They had professed that they wanted to radically disrupt the industry, radically disrupt the industry. Amazing. Right? I love it. But the yellow flag I had to wave for them, Nicole, was, the data didn't suggest that they were radically innovative in how their leaders were all wired. When I looked at them individually, when I looked at the aggregate data, you saw a lot of, it's insurance. So a lot of us get led to professions and industries that fit our persona. They were high prudent, high perfectionistic, risk averse, approval dependent. So all these things kind of inferred, you're not wired to wake up and look in the morning at, what do I blow up today? Where do I go take a calculated risk, much less a radically disruptive risk as an individual and as a collective team.
[00:14:56] So what we had to do was like, let's just call a pause. Let's look at how you're naturally wired. Do you have all the right people on the bus? Given that large aspiration you have for the organization, what do we need to do proactively, planfully, intentionally with the leadership team and infuse some disruptors on the team? Or otherwise we're going to be thinking we're headed toward radical disruption and we're making micro little improvements and changes.
[00:15:19] Nicole Greer: And I tell you, you said this thing earlier, you said, it's a tendency. You know, I do think that people can wake up to the fact that, oh, I'm not like this, but they can, try to build some muscle or at least something called open-mindedness, right? Yeah. So I think I think your story is fantastic.
[00:15:36] Okay. So, we can change people's awareness of how they show up with coaching. That's the first thing that we want everybody to say. 'Cause here's the thing, Greg, people tell me all the time, so and so, he's never going to change. And I'm like, well, not if we don't coach him.
[00:15:52] Greg Smith: Right, right.
[00:15:54] Nicole Greer: Right, right. And I mean, maybe he's not coachable, but either way, we're going to kind of poke on this fella, you know, we're going to talk to him about coaching to maybe wake him up. And I do think people can change. I really do.
[00:16:07] All right, so defining coaching. Let's just define it for a second because there might be some folks that are like, there's so many words rolling out there. There's like, mentoring, consulting, managing, leading, coaching. What is coaching in your mind? What's the definition you've got rolling around?
[00:16:22] Greg Smith: Wow. And thank you for calling that out, because so many of our colleagues and friends are so well intended have not been trained as a coach, and they don't truly understand the difference between when I'm coaching, when I'm consulting, when I'm advising, when I'm mentoring. And those are very different jobs.
[00:16:39] And so I wouldn't be me if I didn't say this, Nicole. Because of that, we have kind of a wild west in the coaching industry and what folks experience. So, you know, you mentioned this a little earlier, but more explicitly is when we look at the broader industry of "coaching," only about 50% -- I'm using air quotes here now-- only 50% of "coaching" that occurs in the marketplace achieves an outcome, achieves a result. And it's because of a number of things, but the primary factor is that, you know, it's a wild west. So if I'm engaging in a coach, I do want to understand and see Nicole has been professionally trained as a coach, so it tells me she is a coach. And I was in HR in the early stage of my career. We're well intended, right? We listen, we advise. We're armchair psychologists. We are great colleagues. We're great listeners.
[00:17:25] But many folks think I've been coaching my entire career. No, you really haven't. You've been doing a lot of amazing, valuable things, but you've probably not been coaching as defined by-- just the layman's terms for me are, how am I engaging with someone in their agenda, at their growth vision, helping them to create a pause, create a place and space where they can self-reflect. Think about what's gotten them where they are, what's going to help them ascend to that next level, that next summit for them, whatever that is. And leading them to new behaviors, not leading with, not coaching, not advising, listening and asking questions to prompt self-reflection, to increase self-awareness, to challenge them toward, and help hold them accountable for trying new behaviors.
[00:18:10] Nicole Greer: So good. So good. And I would just add to the definition, if you are thinking about the fact that you want to do some coaching, and you want to take that, I mean, I would definitely encourage you to take a look at the ICF International Coaching Federation definition, which is working with somebody in a thought-provoking, creative way to enhance their personal and professional life.
[00:18:33] That's their definition. So don't miss, everybody. This is about getting people to change the way they think about their life, not to advise them. Because how many of y'all been told something, you know, Hey, you know what you ought to do, Greg Smith? You ought to do that. And he's like, okay, thanks. But he goes and does whatever he wants.
[00:18:51] Greg Smith: Right. Exactly. As soon as I hear, "you ought to,"
[00:18:54] Nicole Greer: Right, right. That's right. Yeah. So one time somebody told me a joke, Greg, they were like, you know, don't "ought" and "should" all over people. And I was like, oh, that is really good.
[00:19:04] Greg Smith: Wow. Yeah. That, yeah. Yeah. You're dropping some nuggets that are now public domain. I'm stealing these today.
[00:19:09] Nicole Greer: Okay. That's all good. That's all good. Yeah. I'm all about spreading the love. Absolutely. Okay. So, you know, let's talk about frameworks. So one of the things I learned when I was in my little executive coaching program at Queens, which was fantastical-- and let me say this too. I don't know if this is your experience, Greg, but when I did my first coaching program, which was a life coaching program back in 2007. We had to practice on each other. There were 16 of us, and it was like, okay, Greg and Nicole, you're together and you're going to coach each other and then you'll switch. And we were like, okay. You know, and we were trying to ask the powerful questions and do the active listening and all the stuff. You're a better person personally after coaching. What do you think about that?
[00:19:50] Greg Smith: Oh, emphatically yes. Likewise, when I first went through coach training and in 2008, I believe it was, it's the same. You're learning all the foundations, all the principles, the ICF eight competencies of effective coaching, and you're practicing with one another. That immediately makes you a better listener as part of it, you know, level three listening. How am I listening at depth where I'm suspending my beliefs, my judgment, I'm tuned into Nicole. What is she saying? What am I picking up holistically about her body language, her eyes, the look in her eye, the tone of her voice? I'm all about Nicole at the moment. What is she saying?
[00:20:20] And you're doing a great job demonstrating this in our conversation today. You're recounting, "Greg, what you just said..." in a, not just a literally what you said. So, my wife, who offices upstairs from me is also a coach. So there's constant coaching when you want it, when you don't want it all day, every day. Which again, and I tease about that, but it is it's a genuine blessing that I've got someone listening to me when I don't know it at times, going, "Hey, did you realize you said this when you were talking to Nicole?" No. How might you have said that differently? Ooh, you're coaching me. But I like where you're going, so yeah, emphatically, it makes you a better listener. It makes you a better partner. It makes you a better parent, friend, colleague, coach. Yeah. All the things.
[00:20:58] Nicole Greer: All the things. Yeah. I just, it just makes you a better human if you have coaching skills. So, so good. Yeah. All right. So that's important. Okay. Back to coaching frameworks. Okay. When I went through that little program, I was introduced to different frameworks. And so, as I was doing that, I'm like, you know, I think I have my own ideas about frameworks and so I came up with the S.H.I.N.E.™ coaching methodology. I went out, trademarked this thing, and so I believe: people need to self-assess, which Greg has confirmed. You've got to take your assessments, You've got to turn the mirror inward. There's habit work, which you could equate with behaviors that we're talking about. People need to be thinking about the quality of their integrity, their character, I, they need to have some next right steps laid out. Like, where are you going? And then they have to manage their energy. So that's kind of my framework. What's the framework that you all use?
[00:21:48] Greg Smith: Wow. And I wrote down S.H.I.N.E.™ and I need to study that more, but I think there's beautiful alignment, Nicole. I mean, you know, if I'm purely coaching. I'm working with my client, my candidate to over time just build trust for you to pause, self-reflect, for us to think together, for you to share, for me to try to do a number of things that raise your self-awareness so that we can begin looking at what are some different behaviors to try. And that can take time. So, it's a little different than when we're coaching executives inside an organization. It's not just, "Greg, what do you bring to coaching today? What would you like to work on? Well, Greg may want to work on X, but if I think about the organization strategies, the organization's cultural imperatives, Greg's role, my leader may say, Greg, that's great, but I really need you working on these cross divisional relationships and creating collaboration. That's what's most important. Ah! So, so what I would start with, for us in corporate engaged executive coaching, is a sponsor team and alignment. So it's not just Greg saying, what is it I want to work on? It's Greg, his leader and his talent partner, one giving kind of three points of view around what's really going to unlock that next level of greatness in Greg as a leader here at this organization and in his role. That also kind of creates this magical little ecosystem around Greg. I've just said to my leader, I'm working on X and to my talent partner, so I know they're watching me. That enhances my own process tension. It sets accountability factors already too for them to be giving me feedback. So, and that's just around alignment on what are the objectives of the coaching engagement. Again, you know, we must begin with the end in mind. What is it I'm working on?
[00:23:23] Nicole Greer: That's a little Stephen Covey moment, everybody.
[00:23:26] Greg Smith: I know, if I didn't believe that I would be in trouble, but I genuinely believe it. Second, to your point too, is data. How do I get data on that self-assess? So we can work with one another over a series of conversations to, you know, help you think about the feedback you've gotten, how you've shown up to others, and that kinda how do others experience you. And/or I can also infuse that and accelerate that with behavioral data, personality data. And I love it, Nicole, I can't help myself every time I do this. So when we have someone complete the Hogans, we do 360 interviews on them in this data stage. When we go to stage three of debriefing that data, you see them sit up and lean in. Wow, you just told me something in a profoundly different way that I didn't know about myself. So we accelerate that self-awareness.
[00:24:11] So then we get to the, so what? This is how you're showing up to others. This is how they're experiencing you. This is how it's fueling your growth. And oh, by the way, these are the things that are either holding you back and they're a governor on your greatness, or they're outright derailing you because you don't, you didn't realize the impact that was having. It gets us now to coaching to new behaviors a whole lot faster. So alignment, data, coaching. And when we finish an engagement, we don't just, you know, this isn't Carrie Underwood, Jesus, take the wheel, right? We don't just stop at the end of engagement. We need to effectively transition so we support and sustain the growth. So if you're coached me and you've helped me achieve some new level of behavior change, how do you, when you disengage, 'cause you're not there to coach me forever.
[00:24:54] Nicole Greer: We're supposed work ourselves out a job.
[00:24:56] Greg Smith: Right, exactly. You know, and I believe in that, you know, there'll be other times when you achieve a next level and you need to come back to coaching. Beautiful. But we need to effectively transition out. So we are really clear with Greg, his leader and his talent partner on roles and responsibilities as the coach, serving as the catalyst to change, leaves the equation. How do you continue to hold Greg accountable, support and sustain at least that level; and ideally, leverage that self-awareness he's achieved. So he's continuing to look for what are things I'm doing to grow? So those are really the four stages we follow every time. Lots of freedom within the framework, but that's a framework we deploy every time we're coaching.
[00:25:32] Nicole Greer: That's so good. That's so good.
[00:25:34] Announcer: Are you ready to build your vibrant culture? Bring Nicole Greer to speak to your leadership team, conference or organization to help them with their strategies, systems, and smarts to increase clarity, accountability, energy, and results. Your organization will get lit from within! Email her at nicole@vibrantculture.com and be sure to check out Nicole's TEDx talk at vibrantculture.com.
[00:26:04] Nicole Greer: Yeah. And so, I love what you're saying about when the company's paying for the coaching. It's not just this thing. What do you want to work on? It's like, how can we work on what you want to work on in service to meeting these goals for the company? And I think that's what maybe some of our l eaders who are listening need to hear. You know, we're not just going in there doing this soft, easy thing. We're actually guiding people towards higher performance. And there's, it's got a flavor of performance management in it, you know?
[00:26:34] Greg Smith: Yes. Well, Yeah. Nicole, it leads to this, too, and so often, I say this and it's a little tongue in cheek, but I genuinely mean this. Organizations don't need coaching like hard stop. They don't need coaching. What they need are leaders and executives leading differently, leading at higher levels, growing capabilities. Leaders who can execute change, who can sustain change, who can navigate complexity, who can build trust, rebuild trust in the culture of the organization. You need leaders doing things differently. Increased executive capability. And you and I both know that coaching is the most effective mechanism at creating that one-on-one and behavior change at scale.
[00:27:11] Nicole Greer: Yeah, and I think too the executives need coaching so they can experience that. So that they also understand how in turn to do it with the folks that they're leading, right? So, you know, the leader has to go first. You know, you do it first, and then and then I'm able to do it for others. That's so good.
[00:27:29] Well, what's the toughest coaching situation you've ever encountered? So, I'll share one real quick. I get a lot of phone calls, Greg, and people are like, we've got this guy. Like, that's how the conversational start. And I'm like, uhoh?
[00:27:44] Greg Smith: Yeah.
[00:27:45] Nicole Greer: Yeah. And here's the thing. I love that, actually, because you know, they're saying, "This is our last stop on this fella." We've tried to talk to him. We've had the HR conversations, we've had the one-on-ones, we've had the, you know, back to Carrie Underwood, the holy come to Jesus talk or whatever with this person. You know, we just need somebody to see if there's anything they can do. Because here's the truth about some of the clients that I work with, is that they are technically proficient. Like you mentioned insurance earlier and I was talking about finance company, like they get the finance insurance world. In, inside out, upside down. They've got all this institutional knowledge, but they're just not user-friendly. And it's not good to experience them.
[00:28:27] So I had a guy I'm going to call him William. And then he flat out told me, he's like, you know, I'm a little arrogant. And I'm like, I did a Dr. Phil. I'm like, how's that working for you? He is like, not too good 'cause I'm talking to you.
[00:28:41] Greg Smith: Yes. Yeah.
[00:28:42] Nicole Greer: But we got William turned around, you know, he just needed somebody to slow him down and observe what he was doing. So do you have a story?
[00:28:50] Greg Smith: Oh goodness. Yes. Now I think you and I are of similar wiring too. You said this earlier, your brother from another mother, where we want to help. We want to help leaders. We want to help those leaders who even, they've got one foot out the door and the other on a banana peel. We want to help them. So, you know, the fine print underneath all of your and my commercial is the best time to use coaching are in more positive situations, right? I'm proactively invested in leaders.
[00:29:13] Nicole Greer: Yes.
[00:29:14] Greg Smith: Yet invariably these come to us. We get these calls and, you know, I try to guide our colleagues around us as this is not our best use of coaching, right? Always call a timeout. You get a call, I've got a guy. Hey, we've got this guy. Unfortunately. Yeah, and I don't know gender wise, is it more, more often guys?Or this gal.
[00:29:30] Nicole Greer: There are the gals. There are.
[00:29:32] Greg Smith: There are.
[00:29:33] Nicole Greer: can say that a gal.
[00:29:34] Greg Smith: Yes. And that's the one I'll share a little bit about is, you know, genuinely I got a president of a massive global law firm, called and said, Greg, I've got this lady. She is partner, she's our largest revenue producer. Love her, mean it. But she's leaving dead bodies in the wake. Like everybody around her hates her very DNA. They struggle, you know, she's turning over the staff and the team around her, but she's bringing in more revenue than any of your partner in the firm.
[00:30:01] Nicole Greer: Yeah.
[00:30:02] Greg Smith: Like, we can't live without her, but at the same time, we can't live with her. Can you help? And I first said, time out. Like, let me give you your little legal footnotes that you would have on any statement you would put out. Don't expect change. Right. This person has thrived and survived and risen to a highly compensated level of success being who she is. What's going to unlock in her, I need to change. I need to behave differently. So I said, you know, because they were they were clients and they'd be referred to by some other big, large clients. I said, I want to help you, but I really need you to not expect change. We'll try. Let's start with this modified engagement that gets really deep with her to helps her have some self-reflection, raise her self-awareness around who she is, how she's showing up, and how people are experiencing her. It also has got to be coupled with a message from you as her leader that she must change. So now we can get deep and deep in the weeds, but it ended up being a really good equation because it's hard to change an executive who's been successful for years or decades at behaving badly unless something foundational occurs to them or they get the message of, you must change or you must change employment.
[00:31:13] Nicole Greer: That's right. That's right.
[00:31:14] Greg Smith: And so the message to her was good, combined with a really good, compassionate, yet strong and driven coach using behavioral and personality data to have her realize, oh, I didn't realize I was being perceived that way. I just didn't realize it. I am wired and I'm trained for all my career to be right, to always be the smartest person, to always
[00:31:36] Nicole Greer: I got to win the case.
[00:31:37] Greg Smith: I'm an attorney. I'm trained to argue and win. But the beautiful thing was we did this. Let's just do three months of can we just get her to lean in? And in three months he called and said, I'm seeing something I didn't expect. Let's do more. Let's do more. And it was beautiful because when we finished the engagement he literally called me and said, Hey. Can I tell you? I thought this was the worst money I was ever spending. I was throwing it out the door. The change I've seen in her is paramount, like she did a complete 180. She's now someone that people enjoy working with. She just had no clue the way she was treating people, the impact it was having, how they were experiencing her. So this beautiful reward.
[00:32:13] Nicole Greer: Oh, that's so beautiful. I love it. And so please don't miss everybody. Please don't miss this. People can change. They have this thing called a blind spot. And we can help people remove the blind spot. And the way that we do it is-- and here's the thing about coaching. Add to this, Greg, is that when we do coaching, we are calming down, gently asking questions. They're powerful questions. They rewire our neural passageways, these questions. We're listening, but we're putting the person right back in front of themselves during the coaching. You know, it's a two-way street between you and the coach, but the coach is just like trying to get you to have a conversation with yourself really. What are your thoughts on that?
[00:32:59] Greg Smith: No. Yeah, no and it's funny as you probably, I'd love your take on this, probably some of the more effective questions you may ask in, in a coaching engagement or a coaching session with a leader is literally just reflecting back what they said. So Nicole says, X, Y, Z, and I may not say a word.
[00:33:15] Nicole Greer: Right.
[00:33:16] Greg Smith: Or you go, wow, you said X, Y, Z. That's it. It's, you said this, it's getting them to pause and reflect. What are the things I'm saying? How am I interacting with folks? How am I leading folks? And it's just, it's creating that space where I pause and reflect on it and I may be the mechanism. I become that human mirror. I have you reflect on, "You just said this."
[00:33:38] Nicole Greer: Right, right.
[00:33:40] Greg Smith: You're not playing therapist, 'cause you see
[00:33:42] Nicole Greer: No, we'll get in trouble by the ICF.
[00:33:44] Greg Smith: Exactly. You see Fraser Crane doing those, right?
[00:33:47] Nicole Greer: Oh my god. love that show so much.
[00:33:49] Greg Smith: But it's, how am I getting them to reflect and pause? And you said this too, there's neuroplasticity. I can rewire my brain's way of thinking and/or reacting to situations. So what are the things that trigger me and I, you know, I lash out at people. How am I raising EQ? How am I raising my self-awareness to those things that trigger me? And react harshly in ways I don't intend to. To rewire my brain. They go, ah, see them coming. Calm the blood pressure down. Take a deep breath. And then that bad interaction happens. And I go, cool, let's roll with it.
[00:34:20] Nicole Greer: Yeah. Yeah. That's so good. And I just keep getting this one story rolling back through my brain. So we're saying that like sometimes we, you know, we get a person that isn't the high potential and let us just say one more time, that's the best person for coaching. Somebody that has potential that's hungry is an eagle. I call them eagles. And they want to fly higher. Get them in coaching and buddy they will take off. Unfortunately, sometimes we put our, our resources towards the one that is not doing so great or is a problem. We can work with both. But what I'm thinking about is sometimes too, I think coaching, in terms of culture, can uncover bigger dynamics that are going on that might not be evident on the surface.
[00:35:03] So, you know, I had a HR person call me up and say, I would like you to coach this new gal who's just joined us. She's been here about four months and the team is coming to me and complaining about her. And I'm like, really? And you know, so tell me more. And I listen and all that kind of good stuff. And the other thing about coaches is they're not judgy. We're not judges. We're just helpers. Okay? You know, we help people have this thought provoking, creative conversation.
[00:35:34] So, long story short, this leader, it really wasn't her. It was this team and they had hired this lady to come in and get things going. Like this team needs to get rolling. They're not doing what they need to be doing. And so that's what her exact purpose was. Well, I sat her down and I said, you know, what is it like to experience you? She goes, well, I guess I'm a big B. And so of course I asked the powerful questions around that, and she just starts bawling. She's like, I am just trying to get these people to do their job. I'm holding them accountable. I'm putting goals in place. I asked them to sign a team contract. They think I'm a nut.
[00:36:13] Greg Smith: Wow.
[00:36:14] Nicole Greer: You know? And so I mean, this poor gal looks like she's not good. She's actually excellent. She just needs a coach to help her learn to get these other folks rolling. So there's all sorts of crazy situations out there that a coach can help with.
[00:36:28] Greg Smith: Yes. Lots of nuance. And you said this too, so she was new in role. And, you know, again, flashing back to some of the marquis folks-- you mentioned Marshall Goldsmith-- in our space. Michael Watkins in 2000, 2001 ish wrote, you know, The First 90 Days. And it was where I think we all first saw this little ugly metric that continues to be replicated today is roughly 50% of executives fail within the first 18 months in role. And there, there were identifiable, predictable pitfalls that cause them to fail. And they may be great big headline grabbing things that happen to this person as they roll out. Or it may be really quiet. Greg's failed in role, but he's still in role and his team continues to suffer because of it. But the person's team is one of those, you know, variables in the equation.
[00:37:18] Nicole Greer: Of course.
[00:37:19] Greg Smith: How do I show up, establish my brand, demonstrate and illustrate that I'm highly capable and intelligent and I deserve to be here. But if I was promoted from the team to now leading the team, different dynamics. If I was brought in from outside to turn around the team, different dynamics. And I'm already set up to be the bad guy.
[00:37:40] Nicole Greer: She was, buddy.
[00:37:41] Greg Smith: Yeah. I'm here to just drag you guys all along and get you facing in a new a new direction. So lots of those dynamics weigh in when someone's new in role. Again, how do we create some intentional space to pause, self-reflect about who are my new stakeholders? All of a sudden I've got stakeholders. I need to think about who they are. Do I map them out? How do I proactively build some network and relationship with them? So the first time I call my finance partner and go, Hey, I need something from you, is not the first time I call them. I've chatted with them at some point. There's a relationship, there's a rapport. Anyway, you could go around the whole cycle there. So, yeah. So important.
[00:38:16] Nicole Greer: Yeah. So good. So good. So, you know, in your own career, how has coaching changed you in terms of your own performance? I think that, you know, the coaches that we work with out there, they need to have their own success story. Like this is where I was and this is where I am now, and it's because I had a coach. I always say this, Greg. it's kind of spicy, but I say every coach needs a coach or they're hypocritical.
[00:38:41] Greg Smith: Yeah.
[00:38:42] Nicole Greer: Yeah. So I've got two folks talking, speaking into my life all the time going, what are you doing with your one wild and wonderful life, Nicole? And so I'm always you know, moving towards realizing my potential. So what's your story on that?
[00:38:56] Greg Smith: Same same, you know, I shared before I live with a coach, so like or not, I'm getting lots of coaching live real time and I think about like it or not and welcomed or not, but I have a high receptivity to feedback. I always want to hear, I always want to share, and I'm always getting really good in-depth questions about whatever this individual has observed or heard in me. But to your original stem of the question. I think one of the more, gosh, impactful times for me was I was part of Franklin Covey executive coaching practice and a few years ago I was fortunate to get promoted to leading the practice. And I knew this is more than just about me and driving sales and delivery of coaching. It's now rising up and thinking about, from an organizational standpoint, an organizational point of view, this is a new level. I have new stakeholders who are my new stakeholders now, and literally pausing and reflecting and getting some input from others of upstream, downstream, from me. Who are my stakeholders? What does the organization need of the coaching practice? What do they need of me in that role of leading the practice? And seeking input and leveraging a coach to help me pause and think differently about my role. 'Cause I was going through a transition at a time where we were also integrating kind of an external satellite ship to the rest of the mothership. So a time of integration for the coaching practice, a time of me ascending to a different level of leadership amidst all the change and the volatility post COVID that we're all experiencing already. So it was a really tumultuous, like smoke-filled time. And a coach to help me focus on what are the three things I must do? Don't get distracted by the smoke, by the cars crashing around you. How do you focus and drive through the smoke while you're conscious of so many other factors? And so that was, it was a period where a coach was super helpful in helping me focus, pause self-reflect, and identify what are the big wigs I know I need to work on. And what are the things I need to commit to and create some strategies around each one of them. Because hope is not a strategy, another book for us, right? Hope is not a strategy. I can't just
[00:40:56] Nicole Greer: It's a lovely thing.
[00:40:58] Greg Smith: Yeah, can't just hope it's going to be okay.
[00:41:01] Nicole Greer: Yeah. So, long time ago, my first career, I was in the restaurant business, but then I got into property management and had to get my real estate license. And this guy, Bill, he used to say, "You get your prospect in the car and you're hauling, hoping, wishing and praying they'll buy a house." And it's the same. It's the same thing with your client or your stakeholder. You know, you're hauling them around, you're hoping, you're wishing, you're praying. But that's not going to get it done. I mean, those are all good things to emote into place in your heart, but you need a solid strategy in your brain about what this person's going to be working on and then how you're going to get them to think about what I call Next Right Steps. Yeah. So good. So good. All right. So it is, dang, it is already the top of the hour. Greg, could we talk about coaching for days on end? The answer is yes. We could do
[00:41:50] Greg Smith: All day, every day. Yes. Yes.
[00:41:52] Nicole Greer: That's right. That's right. Yeah. So, I'm curious about the future of coaching and what you think. This AI is out there, everywhere. Everybody's got the Gemini and the Copilot and the ChatGPT and the Quad, and whatever's cooking out there. So, you know, dare I say this? I could have a coaching conversation with ChatGPT. I could do that and maybe that would be a really good thing to augment into your life, is to say, to ChatGPT, you know, "How should I behave if I want to pull this off?" Or whatever. Just see what it says. But like, there's nothing, I don't think, that's going to replace like a beating heart and a brain and a soul, and another beating heart, and a brain and a soul. What do you think is going to happen to coaching in the future?
[00:42:35] Greg Smith: Goodness. And this is a good one too. This was one that was one of the Forbes Coaches Council contributions recently about AI in coaching. And it's changing every day. So I think my prognostication would also be filled with hope that we're not going to see that human, that heartbeat, that, you know, neurons and synapses firing, replaced by, just a, a generative AI engine coaching me. And there are folks training those engines to coach more effectively. Now I would say, you know, emphatically, like I think I heard you infer, Nicole, is use whatever engine you want, but use AI to supplement, whether it's taking notes while I'm coaching with my candidate so I'm uber focused on you and not focused on the notes I'm writing and thinking about what I'm writing.
[00:43:18] Nicole Greer: Yeah.
[00:43:19] Greg Smith: To mechanisms for supporting, sustaining, and holding the leader I'm coaching accountable. How do I supplement? And I may challenge you, "Hey, go to ChatGPT, drop these prompts in X, Y, Z. Tell me what that tells you." Just a side on that too, I had a leader that I'm coaching do that a couple months ago, he said, you know, "I went in and I said to ChatGPT, you don't know me completely, but you know me pretty well..."
[00:43:42] Nicole Greer: Right. It starts to know you, everybody. Do you realize that?
[00:43:45] Greg Smith: Knows me well. Yeah. Based on my questions, my prompts, and how I've used you, give me my top strengths and give me my top opportunities to work on. And it was rather profound, because as he said it, I just sat quietly, had to chew on my tongue and go, this is everything I've been telling you.
[00:44:01] Nicole Greer: Right?
[00:44:02] Greg Smith: And he said them out loud and I asked a good coaching question, "What's your reaction to those?" And he went, "It's everything you've been telling me." And I had to say, so it's just told you, but you've not changed behavior. I'm still telling you these things. What are we going to do differently?
[00:44:18] So, a couple things. An AI engine can't contextualize for my culture, vibrant culture. If I've got a vibrant culture or if I've got a really dull, whatever the cultural reality I'm living in every day, what I'm going to get back is the plain vanilla version from an engine. Again, regardless, ChatGPT, Copilot, you name it. It's aggregating data. It can't adapt to my strategies and my cultural imperatives. It can't contextualize to me as the human, what am I already good at? What are the things, what are my wiring and tendencies? And it can't hold me accountable. That human interaction creates an accountability.
[00:44:55] Nicole Greer: That's right.
[00:44:55] Greg Smith: If I know Nicole today, and we finished my coaching conversation with Greg, agree he's going to do X by Y. When we meet again at Y, you're going, Greg, how'd you do? How'd that work? And I know I'm accountable to you, then, the next time we talk. So that's additional process tension for changing my behavior. So there's some things that AI is not capable of doing now, but we can harness it for what am I doing to track my progress, to seek feedback, to get new strategies around my business or some of my leadership behaviors. But it can't replace that human who's giving me time to pause and reflect. And create that process tension for reflection and behavior change.
[00:45:35] Nicole Greer: Yeah, so good. Yeah, I agree. All right, now you have probably said it six times on this call: process tension. Let's just pull that out. That's a little technical coachy thing. Pull that out. What is process tension? Talk about that for a second. That's good.
[00:45:51] Greg Smith: It's an accountability mechanism.
[00:45:52] Nicole Greer: Okay.
[00:45:53] Greg Smith: And in the context of coaching or leadership behavior change, Nicole, what I'm thinking is, I've got people around me and/or systems in place, but with process tension, it's really more around my relationships around me. If I'm going through coaching, I'm telling my team, I'm working on this, I'm going through coaching. I'm going through coaching for positive investment in me as a leader to be a better leader to you, with you, for you, I'm working on these things. That creates process tension because now my team knows Greg's working on this. I'm watching.
[00:46:24] Nicole Greer: Yeah, they are.
[00:46:25] Greg Smith: I'm on my toes, right? I told my leader, I'm going through coaching and ideally my leader knows, and my leader's a part of that equation. But that's not leader knows my leader's also watching me and occasionally going to be asking me. So again, I'm sitting up straight, I'm leaning in. I've created process tension for myself to go, I'm working on something and these people know. So it's creating accountability mechanisms around you.
[00:46:49] But I also often think about it from relational terms. The people I'm working with, my teams I'm interacting with, or colleagues or peers in other parts of the organization. I want them to know I'm working on this and I want to know when I'm hitting the mark or exceeding, or when I'm falling shy of it. All those create that process tension and accountability for me in my relationships around me. And it's not just the formal, Greg's going to work on moving from X to Y by Z.
[00:47:15] Nicole Greer: Right. That's a goal.
[00:47:16] Greg Smith: Right. That's a goal. That's a performance plan. So does that help?
[00:47:20] Nicole Greer: Oh my gosh, so good. Yeah. 'Cause sometimes, you know, whatever area of HR and L&D and coaching you're in, you've got little things you say, and I just thought that was so good. Creating process tension. That is exactly what we're doing. And here's the thing. The word tension, we could do equal sign stress. You know, sometimes I'll be called in to do training with an organization and they'll say, " Everybody's under stress. We need some stress training." And I'm like, okay. But I end up talking about, you know, stress is a good thing.
[00:47:48] Greg Smith: Yes.
[00:47:48] Nicole Greer: Like if you didn't have any stress, you'd be so lethargic and on the couch eating bonbons.
[00:47:53] Greg Smith: Yes!
[00:47:55] Nicole Greer: Yeah. Yeah. And again, it's like, don't you want to realize your full potential? You need process tension. That's what you need.
[00:48:02] Greg Smith: Yes.
[00:48:03] Nicole Greer: Yeah. And you need, you know, dinner with your spouse and a walk with your dog, and time with your kids. You need all that too. But in your day to day, you need a little bit of tension to, to press you and shape you and form you into your fullest potential. So good.
[00:48:17] All right. What nugget, what final nugget-- you know, everybody's like, "Don't let Greg go. We love Greg." So what final nugget would you leave with these folks around coaching?
[00:48:30] Greg Smith: Oh wow. Goodness. I would say be curious, number one. Just be curious. Take a moment to pause and reflect and be curious about, oh, I'll go back to you. How are people experiencing you?
[00:48:41] Nicole Greer: Yeah.
[00:48:42] Greg Smith: And genuinely take some time. Self-reflect, think about it, jot down some notes and reflections. How do my team experience me? How do my peers experience me? Think kind of 360, my customers, my leaders, other colleagues inside or outside the org. How are people experiencing me and is that who I want to be? Is that how I want to show up? And is that what's going to lead me to the levels of success?
[00:49:06] You know, I think today's workforce care more about what we're doing and how we're doing it than just I'm making money and I've got job security. I'm doing something that creates impact and a lot of that self-reflection about my own behaviors, my own relationship, my own leadership is making a big difference around the impact I'm driving or helping my team have.
[00:49:23] So I would say take a moment to yourself to do that. Look for a coach. There are so many scaled options from AI coaches that are going to give you some little brief reflection and insights, to a live human, living, breathing executive coach, life coach, you fill in the blank. Engage a professional to help you think and pause and reflect and ask you questions to help you look at things a little differently.
[00:49:48] Nicole Greer: That is a good nugget. Oh, and bonus nugget everybody. You may not know this, but let me tell you this. Greg Smith is a contributor to Fast Company. And I've got an article, _The Four Secrets to Managing Executive Transitions_. He posted it, it went out on, let's see here, July 16th of this year. I'm going to put that down in the show notes for everybody. I think that's also good. And of course you can find Greg, he's over on the LinkedIn. So if you go to linkedin.com, it's backslash Greg Smith. Super simple and easy. Oh, and you are also on the Forbes Coaches Council, so that was a good slip I just had a second ago. Is that right?
[00:50:25] Greg Smith: Yes.
[00:50:26] Nicole Greer: All right. So this guy knows what he is talking about. And of course, tell us how we can find you. If we want to work with you, to coach, how would we find you?
[00:50:33] Greg Smith: Yeah I love it. Thank you, Nicole. You're very kind. So I, again, LinkedIn is easy. Franklincovey.com. If you want to be fancy franklincovey.com/coaching.
[00:50:43] Nicole Greer: Let's be fancy, people.
[00:50:45] Greg Smith: Yeah, be fancy, right? And there's a number of assets. Again, I love who we are. I love what we do at Franklin Covey. We are about enabling greatness in people, in organizations everywhere and creating behavior change at scale. So there's the time to just assets to go learn and read on your own. But if you want to engage with us, any of those work gregsmith@franklincovey.com is my email. I welcome any questions.
[00:51:04] Nicole Greer: All right, fantastic. All right everybody. If you enjoyed this episode, it takes one hot second. Could you please go down right now, find a little thumbs up, give it a poke. And then would you leave Greg a love note? Dear Greg, when you said this, I thought you were a genius, or whatever you want to leave down there, that would be fantastic. We would appreciate it.
[00:51:20] And if you are watching this on YouTube, if you would share it with a friend or if it's on social media, pass it along to someone you love. We would appreciate it. Greg, it's been a delight to hang out with you, my brother from another mother.
[00:51:32] Greg Smith: It's been my treat. I've really enjoyed it and look forward to future conversations.
[00:51:35] Nicole Greer: All right, thanks. See you later everybody.
[00:51:37] Greg Smith: Thank you.
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