Kendall Wallace - Silicon Valley, Radical Transformation, & Metamorphosis

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Aloha!
 I’m excited to introduce our distinguished guest, Kendall Wallace. Kendall is an expert at transforming teams from a collection of individuals into cohesive, high-performing units. With a unique blend of adventure and strategic facilitation, Kendall creates immersive offsite experiences that significantly enhance communication, trust, and collaboration among team members.

If you’ve faced challenges like remote teams feeling disconnected, low employee engagement, or struggling to bring a sense of unity to your team, Kendall’s expertise is precisely what you need. Through carefully crafted retreats—whether virtual or in-person—Kendall ensures your team not only strategizes and plans effectively but also builds meaningful connections and resolves conflicts constructively.

Having led impactful workshops and offsites at major tech companies like Meta, Kendall has consistently delivered impressive results: improved communication, heightened trust, goal alignment, and increased employee satisfaction and performance. By fostering stronger bonds outside the usual work context, Kendall’s approach leads to teams that are aligned, motivated, and capable of achieving higher performance metrics.

Join us as we delve into Kendall’s innovative methods for creating the ultimate team offsite experience and learn how you can transform your team’s dynamics to drive success. Welcome, Kendall Wallace!

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Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to the True Life Podcast. I hope everybody's having a beautiful day. I hope that the sun is shining and the birds are singing and the wind is at your back. I got an incredible guest for you today and we're going to get into some amazing topics. Let's see, the one and only Kendall Wallace. She is a distinguished guest here at the True Life Podcast. She's an expert at transforming teams from a collection of individuals into cohesive, high-performing units. With a unique blend of adventure and strategic facilitation, Kendall creates immersive off-site experiences that significantly enhance communication, trust, and collaboration among team members. If you face challenges like remote teams feeling disconnected, low employee engagement, or struggling to bring a sense of unity to your team, Kindle's expertise is precisely what you need. Through careful, crafted retreats, whether virtual or in-person, Kindle ensures your team not only strategizes and plans effectively, but also builds meaningful connections and resolves conflicts constructively. Having led impactful workshops and off-sites, At major tech companies like Meta, Kindle has consistently delivered impressive results, improved communication, heightened trust, goal alignment, and increased employee satisfaction. I think Monty will be right back. I'm here. Hi, everyone. This will be cut from this segment, but it's okay. Anyway. Excited to talk with you all. I think we're waiting for Monty to get back. I'm back. There he is. Nice. Thank you very much for everybody watching. I was in the midst of making some big moves from upstairs to downstairs. And so, Kendall, I apologize for the quick interruption right there, but I am really excited on what you're doing and your understanding of building teams and trust and what you have going on as far as building community. And I was hopeful that maybe you could give us a little bit more of a background on how that came to be and why you're doing what you're doing. Yeah, sure thing. Glad you're back, by the way. So how I came to, I guess, work in the field I do now really started from working in big corporate company, worked at Meta, you know, in big tech, kind of having the dream experience of working for one of those big companies, right? however, and it has blessings, you know, it had so many different blessings, but one of the, the things that also had was, um, uh, whenever we had team challenges, uh, you know, people would switch teams or, um, they would kind of the tension would never get fully resolved. Like, and also our, uh, our off sites, our team get togethers and stuff was always just kind of centered around dinners and drinks, which is better than nothing. Don't get me wrong, but it kind of left more to be did to, you know, more to be desired. And, and we do these things that seem to just check a box. Like we'd have a carnival and, you know, the company would spend a lot of money to try and do that and have us have fun or, or these escape rooms. And it's like, at the end of the day though, we still fundamentally, you bring a cross-functional composite of different walks of life together that need to align. And at the end of the day, none of that shifted how, you know, me and other counterparts worked together two weeks down the road. We still have the same challenges. And then we do things like communication workshops and that type of thing. And However, we'd never do them with our teammates. So really kind of seeing the flaws in the system as well as you know, really coming out of that, creating. That's when I moved to Hawaii and started to create experiences to bring people together, to have this mind, body, soul rejuvenation fresh out of kind of the pandemic days. And so The level of bonding that took place in these retreats I created, coupled with seeing this need, really sent me down this path to create experiences specifically designed for teams to really generate bonding and really generate each other to a new level of teammateship and trust with one another while also creating a connected experience that now we have the privilege of creating here in Hawaii where we can take, I've taken team surfing and there's something that hits different when you have this, the sun is setting the water's beautiful and a sea turtle pops up next to you and you know it's just a level of kind of oh wow this is a magical moment and by the way I'm with my teammates and so I just I i profoundly um I guess just to sum up is that you know having had experiences myself where the emotional toll that it can take on one's energy when there is unresolved tension in a team. Yeah, it made me realize, like, I don't want that. I don't want that for other people. I want to be able to create the best, you know, set up the best tee up for teams to really rally for each other, you know, and not be these interchangeable mercenaries. It's true. It's true. Yeah. You know, I like hate that. And, and, and the funny thing is, is companies hate it too. They, they complain. Oh, wow. How do we resolve? Like, how do we hold on to our people? Well, newsflash, and this is my theory on it. You treat them like humans. Like you, you humanize the experience as much as possible. That's how you create people to not be mercenaries. Yeah. I, It's interesting to me to think about the work-life relationship. I'm curious to get your opinion. Do you think that nothing can really be changed unless companies become beholden to their employees versus their shareholders? That seems to be the one thing that's causing this disconnect is that at the end of the day, hey, we want you guys to be a team. We want you to work together, but Bottom line, money is all that matters. Those two things can't coexist. You can't treat people like humans and numbers at the same time. You have to choose. If you're going to treat people like numbers, then you're going to get mercenaries. If you're going to treat people like numbers, you're going to take the vulnerability and the meaning making out of the machine. Is that too far of a bridge? You bring up something very interesting. Because, like, Google just cut a bunch of jobs, right? And their share price went up. And then I'm hearing from some others that it's like, oh, morale's low. Well, no kidding. No kidding. When you instill, like, survival instincts, every man for themselves, and then you wonder why morale is low. I... I do believe, I don't believe it has to be one or the other. I, and maybe, maybe this is just my hopefulness, but I also have seen teams that are high performing that do have a sense of trust and connection. So I think it's possible in those bigger companies, it is more challenging. Yeah. But they're, is I, you know, and even in small companies, it's like, at the end of the day, we got to realize we, none of us, none of us are going to have jobs unless we actually are having an output here. So like, as much as I, you know, you care about others and you, and you want to work as a team, like at the end of the day, everybody, we do have to, you know, be creating an output that, that generates a profit. Otherwise it just doesn't work, you know? Um, So I think, and there's levels, there's ways in which to do that, you know, in, in this stuff I lead that really has people come together and create alignment so that you don't have in a group of 10, you don't have three people that are checked out and detached because their opinion was not, you know, played a part in the group of, you know, the seven out of the 10 just went ahead and made the decision. I think there's ways to, to, you know, bring people together. That's what I like to do in my offsites. Yeah, like it seems in the startup community or in a lot of private industries, like you still have this camaraderie or you have this, maybe it's the vision of the founder that's contagious, you know, but it seems to change on some level. Maybe you could speak to the idea of How do you build meaningful relationships at work? Are there some secrets that you've uncovered when you get people in different states of awareness? Or what are some of the techniques and maybe challenges that you find trying to create meaningful relationships in the workplace? Yeah, thanks for asking. Well, first of all, it's a journey. It's like structuring an employee journey, right? So there's places I can take a team on the third offsite that we can't get to on the first. We just can't. There's not enough rapport built. The foundations of trust aren't there. So building meaningful relationships at work really centers around what inspires people to do what they do? And what do they view as their strengths and their contributions to the team? And do the other team members understand that? I think it's so often like when we just leave it to dinner and drinks, like I find out that like, okay, cool, your son plays t-ball, awesome. cool. Like we, we got to, but that's still surface. Like that doesn't tell me anything about why you show up to work, you know? Okay. Maybe we can, we can read between the lines and see that your kids are important to you. You want to provide like that type of thing, but really having a deeper conversation around, you know, why are you on this team? And maybe it, it actually I've, I've facilitated like values exercises where it's okay that some people are just after the money. It's okay. Like that's, that's okay. You know, and others want to like, you know, grow and got to get promoted and that's okay too. You know, and others are for the purpose alignment, but it's like understanding what makes people tick. Like it's a, it's a fundamental level of just empathetic understanding that helps create meaningful relationships. You know? So yeah, I think that's one of the biggest things is, is creating connection through empathy and understanding. The second is really when there is, we are humans. And so when there is tension that comes up and guess what? It happens because we are humans. Then just if we ignore it, you know, I'm, I'm a big fan of the mattress and the pee, you know, that story, the princess and the bee, right? Of course. the story that, you know, the pee is under the mattress and she stacks all these mattresses on top of the princess is on top of like 20 mattresses. And she's like, this is so uncomfortable. She could still sense the pee. And I believe that's, that's true. I mean, a groups, a team is a group. And I'm a big fan of systems theory where, you know, like, there's only under performers because you have over performers. Like you, the group interaction, you don't have to be at the center of the tension to have the center impact you or to have that tension impact you. So the more we ignore kind of elephants in the room, it just leads to detachment, which then makes people check out, which then makes people Irish goodbye and leave. And so, you know, it's, I think the way to create meaningful work relationships is also centered around straight talk, addressing what's going on and actually working to resolve through it by hearing both sides and making sure everybody is seen, heard and valued and the conflict is resolved. And it's like, even if the conflict isn't fully resolved, it's like, okay, agreeing to kind of just acknowledge it like it is we we as a group acknowledge that it's not quite resolved and we're gonna move on right but it's like as opposed to this like yup it's still there like you know this like half-hearted half the group acknowledging what's going on so I think those, I mean, in my experience, you know, it's the empathy connection building. It's the resolving tension or team dynamics, the issues that are not serving the team. And then it's really aligning as a team so that everybody feels seen, heard, and valued. And And, you know, the last component for a lot of my work is then making sure that when conflict arises, it's just, yeah, it really is. People, the team has the first sense experience of really resolving that conflict, moving through it, and having their nervous system actually be okay. Yeah, those are incredible points, and I they definitely should be the foundation of building a winning team. I think defining terms, especially when we're in different cultures and in the workplace and values is sort of a thorny spot. And the question that comes to mind, and this is a really broad question, so feel free to take it in any direction, is that sometimes you hear people say, these people are so self-entitled, and then you have other people that are like, look, self-worth, I'm worth this. What do you think is the relationship between someone who's entitled and someone who has self-worth? They seem similar in a lot of ways, but they look very different. Wow, that's a great question. Yes, thank you. I almost want to hear your answer first. I know that's a cop-out, but you've probably given it some thought. I'd love to hear. Well, I see it a lot. Here in Hawaii, I come from Caucasian acres in San Diego. And when I came to Hawaii, I was thrust into this mix of all this incredible melting pot of different cultures, like Filipino and Japanese and Hawaiian, all these different Asian cultures and different family structures and generational living. And what I didn't understand was going into the workplace. I worked for a Fortune 500 company at UPS and, you know, the different attitudes towards work. And I found myself on the receiving end of you are so entitled. And I'm like, I'm worth it. I believe that I work really hard and I believe that this is not only am I worth it, but everybody I work with is worth it. And I was met with this incredible resistance of you arrogant, self-entitled knucklehead. And I couldn't really bridge that gap. Because in my mind, I'm like, this is what I was taught my whole life. I was taught to fight for what you believe in. And if you work hard, you deserve to have it. And then I was able to flip sides and look at it from this other angle like, oh, you think you're better than everybody? And I'm like, that's not what I thought. But I could see how it was received that way. And I bring it up because I don't really have a great answer for it, but I can see that divide since it happened to me. And I'm kind of searching for an answer because I don't want to be looked at as entitled. And I think a lot of people that are fighting for what they believe in, they don't want to look like arrogant and entitled. They want to look like, hey, I'm working really hard. I'm fighting for this. So I guess my answer to the relationship between entitlement and self-worth is empathy. It's like, okay, what is really going on here? Like there, these are two different words. Are we looking with two different cultures? Are we looking at a monetary issue? But maybe that could be a, you know, maybe there's a course in there. Maybe there's a, there's a team building in there for leaders. It's like, what's this relationship like? It's not much of an answer either, but I'm curious to get yours. Yeah. Um, Yeah, it's an interesting thing. I think it's just whether entitlement or high value of work, I think is... ultimately about naming something that's unnamed, just bringing, it's just having an empathetic conversation around, you know, bringing what's under the surface to the surface. I think, so I'll think of two examples, like, so... that, you know, one one is, you know, engineers in tech. Right. They're so they're paid so much. Right. And when I was a member of the design team, I would always kind of just it was kind of this this um whenever there was any criticism around like you know the guys this thing we're building it's not testing well with the with the clients with the customers you know these three hundred thousand four hundred thousand paid engineers would take it so personally right and so the whole design team really felt like what what are you come on like you're getting paid this much like take a little bit of constructive feedback like You know what I mean? Like, do you want to be coddled? No, but seriously. And I think about that as you're talking about entitlement, because it's just like, that's what it brought up for me. And, but there was a missing piece to that conversation was actually me vocalizing exactly that, right? It's like, guys, like, do we want to create a great product or do you just want to get promoted? Like, let's just, let's come to terms on where everybody really is on this team. And so, yeah, and I think what's also interesting is Similarly, in a lot of product teams, because that's my background, right? So a lot of product teams, like the PM is the quarterback. The PM is like the leader. Everybody kind of looks to the PM, you know, because they're direct. They're like the orchestra conductor, you know, for the team, right? Like you got to follow the lead. of the quarterback, right? It's not like the cornerback will hike the ball. Like that doesn't work. So we would look to them and then it's, it's really funny. Cause I recently did a, a study as a survey where it was kind of understanding team dynamics, challenges within product teams and heard from PMs that they're like, yeah, everybody's always looking to us like for the answer. And it was like, well, that's because the other people think they're supposed to look to you. But then you feel that you need your team to help set the direction. It was like a chicken or the egg situation. And I think that's kind of the same way with this entitlement piece is really... Yeah, it's kind of having the conversations that need to be had so that you can really... humanize your peers. Humanize your peers. I hope that somewhat answers your question. It does. I'm grateful for your answer because it seems to me that for a long time, tech has been at the forefront of change. In doing so, so has the corporate structure been at change. It seems like what you're doing is helping people reorganize the way they relate to work. And that's kind of what seems to be happening in this world. Like there's a lot of heartache, there's a lot of job cuts that you could argue that we're borderline in a depression, but that means big changes are coming, whether they're people getting cut or people reevaluating what's important to them, definitely people reevaluating relationships. And do you think that maybe what we're seeing while painful is a sort of opportunity to reimagine the workplace, to reevaluate it. On some of your workshops and some of these exercises that you're doing, I think are very cutting edge. And I think that that's what you're doing is you're sort of spearheading this new way to relate our relationships to work on some level. What do you think? If I'm even cracking any of that, that's... that's that's it that's what I want yeah you know absolutely so I didn't I didn't mention this but I'll I'll now level a little bit more of vulnerability into the conversations um so my experience in in So I'll actually walk you through. Okay, please. So when I was working in big tech, I was passed up for promotion. And so what happens, and this happens a lot, right? It was when someone's passed up for promotion, they start to detach. Yep. especially then it's like, then it's like, okay, you gotta, you gotta like, all right, I gotta strive so, so much more with my output. Then a, Tension was created with the quarterback of the team, the PM, between myself and her. And you see, my entire pathway for promotion in the future was based on, for that particular role, the research, is based on the ability to influence the product direction, okay? With the research, with the research that's going on. Now, this particular quarterback wanted to set the the pathway for the product not incorporating research whatsoever she's like it's my way this is this is the way I'm going with this I want this product direction so no matter what uh what I did to influence her it was just it wasn't going to go that way because of the way she kind of had her mind set on the product direction And here you go. It's a situation that, quite frankly, exasperated into me getting fired for not being a good teammate. And I bring that up because what started as literally you can see the crevices of like this misalignment and this one person just trying to go for survival. This other person, quite frankly, I didn't find out until later, was also she was. trying like had also had a similar experience for got passed up for promotion and was just trying to make sure her way got one and so you see how this like and of course she viewed me as like yeah I have this teammate that's not helping me like right so and listen you know as much as guess the hard thing you know is some people are like yeah team building whatever like or your experiences to help improve communication like it doesn't really matter it doesn't matter until your livelihood's taken away yeah it doesn't matter until those moments of tension become serious miscommunications that result in serious consequences and then you got to look in the mirror and see it. And I don't want that for teams. And I do absolutely believe there's a better way. And the better way is not missing the layup of taking a communication class, not with your teammates. You know, it's not checking a box. We did team building. Great. Let's check that one off. We did it in a conference room without any windows. Yeah, that sucks. It's like... There's actually a different way. As the consciousness of the planet is raising, and without getting too woo-woo, truth be told, I think there's a more fun, more joyous, more soul-nourishing experience to be had with how we connect with our colleagues. And I am here to help teams create that. Like, absolutely. Why? Because I know what it's freaking like and I experience the consequences when you don't have that. And it sucks. It sucks to have such a emotional toll being weighed on you to have dinner table conversation and friends conversation about how you're, in different ways, you're unfulfilled in the workplace. Instead, what's possible, I believe, is to create that connection resolve tension and then truly actually align as a team you can look around the table and actually look people in the eye which these are also traits according to pentland did a study on high performing teams they look each other in the eye they don't just look at the leader or the person who has the question you know and there's like different tools too different tricks I mean I'll just I'll give you one yeah um A fun one that I think is great is, you know, so often when you're aligning a group of people, everybody's like, you know, should we move forward with this? And then it's kind of like you have crickets or it's uncertain kind of exactly how it is. So a tactic I love is, all right, on a scale of one to five, five being the highest, one being meh, How much do you support this decision? Everybody put up your hand, just five fingers and show me where you are. Right. And so you see visually, you look around the room and you see visually where everybody is. Now, anybody three or less, what is it going to take to get you to a four or five? And maybe if they have a completely different direction, then it's like, you know, come back tomorrow with like what, yeah, with your case, and then everybody else can vote again. And then basically, the point is, is anybody three or less, you got to start to make concessions on what it's going to take to get you to a five and then come back. And that's called a negotiation. That's how everybody actually, all 10 people can leave that room being like, wow, I feel heard. instead of you get this invisible one out of the nine or two out of the, you know, two out of the 10 that, you know, just are kind of like sitting there being quietly complacent. Does that make sense? Yeah, it makes total sense. I think that that particular sort of negotiation or that particular sort of trustful communication allows for high output, high productivity and a functioning team. I think that is where you know, the majority of companies wish they were at. And that leads to better products. It leads to better service. It leads to better communication. Quite often it seems that the opposite way is the sign of a dying animal. When you have to force feed everybody something, it's like a machine at a hospital. You have to force feed them to keep them alive. When you have to force feed people ideas, there's no energy behind it. There's no love behind it. There's no power behind it. There's just the mundane guy digging a trench. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know what? This is kind of out there. Like I deal a lot, a lot of my podcast talks a lot about PTSD, mental wellness, and just different types of mental stress that causes people to function less than who they really are. And I think that seems to be a symptom of the system we live in. And when you look at what's happening at workplace, there's a lot of wellbeing and there's a lot of these programs that do check a box. Maybe it's going for drinks. Maybe it's doing jumping jacks before you start work and maybe it's having a motivational speaker come in. But do you think there's a place in the future for some sort of like psychedelic therapy? Like maybe, you know, I know that there's people that are working on microdosing and getting insurance companies to study microdosing on some level. but I think that that creates a sort of alternate state of awareness. Maybe it's vulnerability. Maybe it's, maybe it's just an altered state of awareness, but, and I know that's kind of a bridge way out there, but what are your thoughts on that? Oh, I would love that. Me too. I would love that. Um, I'll speak personally. Okay. Um, the use of psychedelics and, um, specifically MDMA therapy, has been profoundly healing for me. Yes. And, you know, that journey, like, has opened so much, has made me understand levels of Little T trauma. I, you know, I, I have to admit, I kind of grew up very privileged. And so I have a lot, I have the little T trauma. Um, but I, you know, still it, it, it, it had an impact. Well, I mean, I'll speak. Okay. So this is a fun one. So let's be candidly. This is kind of bringing, bridging both together. is I mentioned that moment of me not getting along with a teammate and it was very triggering for me because I felt not listened to. It was like her way or the highway. And then someone asked me after I left, they said, where else in your life did you have that experience of not feeling heard or listened to where it was this person's way or the highway? And I was like, Are you kidding me? I was just playing out unhealed mom stuff in the workplace. For God's sake. And so what's funny about that is actually since then, though, I've become a student of Bowen theory, which is all about how your upbringing and the family in which you were raised actually influences how you operate in the workplace. And I've been a student of the Bowen Center for Family just to better understand that so I can do some diagnostics in my off sites. And. I think under, I think namely understanding specifically your upbringing, but also just earlier parts of life, how they can influence how you operate in the workplace, I think is really important self-awareness exercise. And I can't really force it in my offsites, but I sure like to do some journaling exercises around it. And so, and we'll take some popcorn chairs for whoever's going to share. Uh, and cause I think that's incredibly insightful. I mean, I have two older brothers, so me being the littlest also is like, no wonder too. For me, it was incredibly important to feel heard and seen and like, hey, listen to me. What I have to say is important. What I have to say is important. Where do you think that comes from being a little sister? So these aspects of self-awareness are incredibly impactful and they're actionable now. And you know, psychedelics is incredibly, has been so powerful on my healing journey, and I would love to see a world where, you know, before the end of my lifetime, we could get there. I think, you know, teams, just the executive leadership teams who are really willing to go there, potentially, we'll just either have to go to a different country or go underground for the foreseeable future. You know, I mean, that's kind of the reality a little bit that we're in, but I would love that because, you know, I think it's incredibly healing and bonding. And we also know that, the level of peak experiences that can happen, like a peak, or sorry, how important peak experiences and shared experiences are for creating meaningful relationships. Another thing I think that I'm beginning to incorporate that touches on some of these aspects is ice baths. yeah in my in my off-site experiences and I think there's there's also something there to be gained when you do have a group and maybe you do have someone who is not quite loving the way they look in a bathing suit but who has a team that comes with care and love to like a loving presence to really rally around this person, as long as they're not in the trauma response, you know, as long as they're willing to go there and really like, you know, kind of overcome that fear of being seen in a swimsuit, you know, and do a nice bath. Like there's something there too of that, that just, it's that caring presence of like, you're gonna overcome a challenge for yourself. or even where we live, you know, jumping off a cliff. I've seen teams do that too. It's this loving presence, you know, that it's like, we're gonna help you overcome something that you're challenged by and it's like, You're actually going to do the work yourself, but we're going to cheer you on. That's the level of care that creates trust. That's the level of care that's humanizing. That's the stuff that is magic. You do that, and don't tell me a month from now when we're working on a project and you need something, I will not rally behind you. No chance that those high-level experiences 100% create trust. that level of connection that you want. So I think we can start to do it now with many experiences of creating that same loving presence. This is what I mean by, I think what you're doing is on the cutting edge. In a lot of ways, what you're describing are rituals and rites of passage. And when you take leaders and you go through rituals and rites of passage that distinguish them as leaders and you give them experiences of how to overcome, then they're able to translate that experience and help the other people overcome. You know, and it's the difference between a leader and a manager, right? A leader is someone who does the right thing and a manager is someone who does things right. And we have been in, there's nothing wrong with being in a management position. I think it's great, but I think managers are leaders. And I think that they should be given the freedom to act as leaders because that's when we start bringing everybody up. And I feel these things that you're describing are in fact a throwback to, you know, ritual, right? Like this is, we're going to have this group ritual together. I am going to show you an altered state of awareness that you can have forever. Like that's beautiful, Kendall. I love it. You're right. Oh, I love that you get it. Like, thank you. Thank you. Yeah. Thanks for doing it. And for rallying it on. Yeah. And I think that's the thing is, you know, I mentioned earlier about these, you know, these engineers that you remember that when I was on that team, that level of like. you're, you're getting paid all this money. Like you can deal with a little criticism, but there's something, there's something there too. There's like, there's something they're struggling with, whether it's, whether it's actually understanding the criticism or whether it's something a little bit more, but like there's a level of elevation that can take place when we have a a setting or a space to really figure out what that is and then as a team help that person with that and it you know I'm not saying we need to do group therapy for all our our our you know business meetings that's not what I'm saying what I'm saying is just just give a little bit of space to understanding what makes people tick what like you know if someone's very resistant to criticism like helping understand a little bit more around that so that we can as a team can actually operate more effectively because them understanding how to ex how to take in that feedback is actually going to help the whole product it's going to help the whole thing but you can't move forward when one person's kind of like No, I can't do that. You know, it just like that level of energy. Armor. Armor. We are not doing this. It's just like, you're killing me, Smalls. You're killing me. You know? Yeah. I love that movie, Sandbox. It speaks to the idea of Generation X, I think, on so many levels. Yeah. I think there's something to be said about shared sacrifice and shared goals. And sometimes people in really high performing situations or people that are really high performers, you know, maybe people don't understand the sacrifice they got to get there. And I think that that can bother people at a certain level. It's like, do you realize how much school I went through to get here? How dare you question me? And I get it. If someone has sacrificed so much, when you question them, you're calling their sacrifice, you're calling their God into question in a way. You know what I mean? I've sacrificed everything for this. How dare you? It's a mesmerizing to me. And I think that we are on the cusp of changing things. I'm so thankful for it. me too it's almost like a resurgence though of like the type of team building from the 80s ah okay I think in a lot of ways the 80s and 90s which was actually like going outside yeah like we're gonna go outside and actually you know there's uh my mentor actually did uh the senators and executives outside and had them own each sleep in their own tents overnight. They would come back together and talk about it. I mean, it's like this, it's these, these experiences that allow people to grow as people. Yeah. And then, and then, Oh, by the way, this is sponsored by your company. Cool. Like that's that because your company cares about you growing as a person. Um, and yeah so I i just love what you've said too about ritual I think that's so right thank you for pointing that out I didn't you know it's it's a term that I've used sometimes but I just I love how you you've truly labeled it like yeah what you're doing is creating ritual and ritual is so important so important Think of the Eleusinian mysteries. You used to have emperors and slaves alike. It's their birthright to go. And they sit together and they watch the death of Persephone. And there's no talking really, but you and I together as a team, we get to be part of this ritualistic ceremony. And in doing so, we have a shared experience that rises above language. That is what builds team. It's ineffable, but you and I can feel it between us. Yes, we did this together. We could probably do other things together. We have this trust. We have this relationship. And now we can go back and bring the water back to the team. We went to the well. We got it. Here it is. Drink it up, everybody. Right? Yeah, totally. It's funny. There's something I really am looking for the right team to do it with. Yeah. What I really want to do is I want to do a version of Hot Ones with a CEO. Do you know Hot Ones? Are you familiar with it? No. Okay. So it's where he eats buffalo wings or vegetarian cauliflower wings, but with hot sauce on it. And they ask him very well-researched questions. And I think there's a level, too, of this shared sacrifice. Imagine a whole team watching their leader literally suffer and be vulnerable. Because you're creating the experience of this high stress. It's really fun to watch. He interviews celebrities, but I think it'd be really cool to do with a team. Basically, because the person's under such high stress of the hot wings that it affects a part of their brain where the filter's gone. And so they answer really honestly. And I just think how powerful to have... a an experience like that where you're seeing your leader be vulnerable in that way and you're seeing them put their guard down and you're seeing them you know sacrifice to to humanize themselves in a way I think it's just a fun way of kind of creating that that I'm looking to uh to to create protein yeah you know what like I love that idea what about adding in like like some sort of language to like, okay, you are the leader. You, everybody can eat two super hot fire wings or you can eat all of them as a leader. What are you willing to do? You know what I mean? Like you're the leader. Are you the leader? Okay. What are you willing to sacrifice for your team? And it could be done in ways where it's anonymous. You know, you could put stuff out there, but everybody could see. And on some level, like you could really see, who's vulnerable and where they need work. And maybe this person shouldn't be the leader. You know what I mean? But it could be destructive as well as cohesive. But I think breaking down boundaries is a part of team leadership. Like this is where this person's weak. Like if you are the leader, what's the right thing to do? And it could even be like theoretical. As a leader, are you willing to take that for your team or not? You know, like I don't know the right answer, but like maybe everybody can talk about it. Right, and also it's interesting to see how teams would react for their leader, you know? Right. Be like, you better not make me do this. Like, you already did so much, you know? Or, like, yeah. Well, the other thing I'll mention, too, is it's always in all the team-building books, like, there's one exercise that is always, like, people just put as the best for building team trust. And it's actually an exercise from the Navy SEALs where they have to pick up and move a log and they have to do it all together because it's so heavy. And I mean, I really wish we could do that in corporate America too. I think, you know, like having an experience, like it's, I have to figure out a, I mean, that's, that's my task is to figure out like these, these rituals and experiences that maybe, maybe without, it's like a metaphorical log, you know, how can we do that? Cause I'm, I think there'd be too many, like, ah, my knee hurts and stuff like that. Um, you know, that, that we didn't actually do it physically, but. That's beautiful. And that's just an excuse, right? Like, oh, my knee hurts, or I can't do it right now. What about something emotionally heavy that everybody had to carry at the same time? There might be something there. That's exactly right, yeah. Man. I think that tends to happen really when you kind of have two sides that are kind of at an impasse that need to reach each other. reach resolution and have all other team members be part of the process. Yeah. Like I said earlier, you know, tension between two team members, you might just say it's those two, but it impacts everybody in the team. It's kind of like, you know, mom and dad are fighting saying that, oh, it's just between the two of them. It doesn't impact the children. Really? Because last time I checked, that would definitely impact the children. Yeah. You know, it's just you're kidding yourself if conflict between two people doesn't impact everybody else who's just a part of the system. Agreed. Yeah. Power dynamics, hierarchy. And I really I'm looking forward to learning more about the Bowens. And I never thought about it. But, you know, the workplace is sort of an extension of family. And if you were taught a certain way to relate in your family, of course, you're going to bring that into the workplace. How can you not? Specifically conflict, actually. So specifically how you were taught to deal with conflict, whether you were taught to avoid it or to engage. That patterning really plays or sticks with individuals. And that's why part of what's really important, too, is at an offsite at some stage, you know, typically like the second offsite, once you build rapport, it's really figuring out the conflict patterning that people have, and then how we want to deal with conflict as a team when it does come up. So you can make and understand where individuals come from and then also have a team kind of policy, almost like an SOP. You know, this is how we're going to deal with it when it comes through. Because it's true. It comes through all the time. So, like, for example, with my reports and my company, I have a monthly check-in just regularly to we talk about our working relationship and how am I showing up for you? How can I show up better? And this is where I shut up and receive, as the manager, the feedback. But then we also just talk about what's working in the business relationship, what's not, and what we can put into place next month that make it better. And I think having these frequent communications with those you work closely with is key. It's a key to keeping the system you know, in flow and devoid of viruses. Yeah, I think so too. It's wonderful to think about Kendall, I could probably talk to you for another hour. And we should definitely come back on because I feel like I'm just kind of scratching the surface. And I have a bunch more questions. And I've got another engagement coming up. But this is fascinating. I like what you're doing. I think it's really fun. And I think we should get some more people in the conversation and have more robust conversations. Can you come back? Yeah, let's do it. And, I mean, we can even talk more about teams. We can talk more about psychedelics. Absolutely. You'd like, but yeah, it's been a real treat and I love the thoughtful questions that you've asked and yeah, just your enthusiasm around what I'm doing too is just, it's really awesome to be a part of. So thank you for having me. Yeah. The pleasure is all mine. And I think more, I think if anybody's listening to this, whether you're listening to the live stream or whether you're, on a road trip or you're running or you're listening to the podcast somewhere, go down to the show notes and check out Kendall. She's got some incredible ideas. And I really think what she's doing is not only building teams through shared sacrifice and shared goals, but she's building a better tomorrow. For those listening, I just want to throw this one part in. I think on some level, if you ever want to be a leader, you have to be fired. If you ever want to be a leader, you have to understand what it's like to lose what you thought was your identity. It's the only way. And I know some people have a negative bent about being fired or sometimes it's on a resume. But if you ever found yourself in that situation, I want to say congratulations to you because you've done something and hopefully you're working through something that most people don't. might not be able to do so people should be proud of that on some level so let me thanks for letting me throw it out there but I'll throw it back to you before I go where can people find you what do you have coming up and what are you excited about yeah thank you oh just such a treat right so you can find me on instagram guys my uh handle is kendall wallace one two three And if you're curious at all about how I create offsites, how I eat any team exercises that I use, I actually give away my playbook for free because I just want more teams to really create trust within their organizations. So I give it all away. And if you're interested in getting that, then you can DM me Monty plus playbook and I will pass it to you. and um yeah and so dm me there or find me on linkedin and dm me um and yeah just super excited I'm going to two conferences actually um coming up uh in the next two weeks so I'll be off island and just basically all about group, it's a group dynamic group relations conference. So all about analyzing how it is that you operate within groups, which these are profound self awareness opportunities. So I'll be going to two of those so that I can really begin to integrate some more of that curriculum into my own offsites. I can't wait to learn more of what you learned there. It's cutting edge. It's going to be beautiful. And I think it's building a better tomorrow. So ladies and gentlemen, thank you so much for hanging out with us today. Go check out Kendall. She's an incredible individual who cares about building a better tomorrow. So look her up, reach out to her, and tell her you saw her on the True Life Podcast. That's all we got. Kendall, hang on briefly afterwards to everybody else. Have a beautiful day. We love you. Aloha.