510 | Cultivation: Developing New Leaders

Chris LoCurto 0:01
What leaders need to be doing once they've started making their team successful, is coming up next.

Welcome to the Chris LoCurto show where we discuss leadership and life and discover that business is what you do, not who you are. Welcome to the show, folks. I hope you're having a fabulous day, wherever you are. It is a beautiful sunny day where I am right now. And I'm absolutely enjoying not having a bunch of rain. So hope you're having a great day as well. Now today, we'll continue the series that we're calling cultivation, and what are we cultivating or cultivating leaders? Now we started with part one talking about making others successful which is one of our favorite things to do around here. And you've heard me say it 1000 times before, but let me say it 1001 times. Your job as a leader is to make others successful, not the other way around. It is one of those things that I hate to say it. But I think in our crazy world of social media, you know, gurus and you know all of these pop-up amazing leaders that are teaching you how to hustle, hustle, hustle like crazy, making it more important than other aspects of your life. One of the things that I continuously see come across in their messaging is how important you are. You are important. You're important to me. But listen, as any great leader actually understands. Your importance is only according to how you can make other people very successful at what they do. If you can't get people to follow you, none of that matters. Often I say in events if you want to find out if you're a leader turn around. If nobody's following you then by definition, you're not leading anybody. Right. So let me highlight two main points that we hit last time before we go into today's episode, we said that the greatest challenge and perhaps your greatest success as a leader will be making others great, making them successful building your team into something right. So let me say it in another way. You're in the construction business, the business of building others up and making them successful in their role on your team. Now we ended part one by saying leaders, you've got to learn to take others with you take them alongside you show them what to do show them how to do it, watch them as they do it, and empower them to show others as well. So while that's a very summarised version of what we teach, as far as proper delegation, I think you get the idea.

Now, obviously, there's a tonne more to that and making sure that you delegate properly. But that kind of rounds that out for you. So leaders teach leaders, they mentor them, and they, by definition lead others, when you begin to see other people's success as part of your success as a leader, then you're becoming a true person of influence. Now, here's the deal. Sure, you're going to have some folks on your team who enjoy their role. Maybe you helped make them successful in their current role. Great. Now, they can even help other people around them to be successful, too awesome. It's working, this is what you're looking for. But that's it. That's all they want. They may never aspire to be anything more than that. And that's fabulous. Not every person is supposed to be an actual leader like I have a role of leadership. This is one of the things I think gets confusing from time to time. You need people to be great at doing the tasks that they do. Right? You need people who are phenomenal at doing the same thing over and over and over again. And believe it or not, if you're not somebody who understands that there are plenty of people who love doing the same thing. Day in and day out. They enjoy that. You may be somebody listening to the show going I can't even possibly understand that. Surely there's nobody on this planet that's like that. Yes, absolutely. There aren't if there weren't, we'd be in trouble, right because we need people that are able to do 10 different things and never like doing the same thing over and over again and we need plenty of people who really enjoy doing the same same thing over and over again. So understand that not everybody is going to become a leader. In fact, that percentage is actually considerably smaller. Now, you're going to have people that are going to stay that same way, you've made them successful in their role, great continue to do so year after year after year. So that they continue to, you know, be phenomenal at the very thing that you're paying them to do. But you will, however, have some folks who want to grow out of their role and into leadership. And that's what we're talking about today. Now, why? Well, here's the progression that we'd like to see in leaders one, they make other people successful, they develop these people into leaders, and then they take these leaders and create teams, these are things that we are looking for, if we can accomplish this, if we can make these things happen, then we do something that's absolutely amazing, we start duplicating us, as a leader can duplicate themselves, then we really start to see some amazing growth. And keep in mind, you can't do it all. If you could do it all, there'd be a billion different single-person businesses. But that's not the way that God hasn't, he doesn't have us doing this by herself. So when we come back, moving to the next level of maturity, as a leader means developing those who you've made successful into leaders, we're going to dig into that right after this. Hey, folks, a couple of years ago, I was visiting with a client, and the CEO said to me, Chris, we're not going to hit our goal.

I asked him what he meant. And he said, We're gonna miss our three-year revenue goal coming out of strap plan by a few months, I didn't realize it at first, that he was having a little fun with me by saying they were about to triple their company in less than three years. How freaking awesome is that? Folks, these are the kinds of results that businesses get by coming through our four-day strat plan event. On average, we find $2.1 million worth of revenue in the next 12 months that the company was not planning on. And this event is for all-sized businesses. If you're small, medium, or large, it works for every single business, because it's not industry specific. It's about gaining all the information about all the things inside of your business that is holding you back from success and then giving you a plan and a process on how to walk that out and be successful in your business. Discovering the things that are holding you back, helps you get to all of those goals that you've been planning on for a long time. So if you're ready to get perspective, you need to solve what's holding you and your business back. So you can grow faster than you need a strap planner to learn more go to Chrislocurto.com/Stratplan. Okay, I love something that Zig said that I really think it just aligns with me, and I believe it aligns with most of the people listening to the show, you don't build a business, you build people, and people build the business now. I think if Zig was alive today, and can see, you know, some of the things that are going on in the world today. I think he might actually look at that and go Hmm, well, I still agree with it. But Surprise, surprise, apparently some people can build businesses and use people as tools that are actually happening. And you know what, some people are being incredibly successful at it. I still don't think for, the thing that they're being successful at is not building a great business, because, by my definition, a great business means that you have people that are great. Sure, they're building businesses that are cranking out widgets, sure, they're building businesses that are selling those widgets and making lots of money. That's great. But for me, business is so much more than that. Business is never going to be just money for me. Business is never going to be just cranking out widgets. I'm just that's not I'm not gonna I'm not that guy. So I lean in the direction of what Zig has said here. You know what he said in the past, and I still that that is a model for me. I don't build a business. I build a team of people. If I can build a great group of people, I want to do business.

Now I guess if my only desire was the money, well then I'd be really excited about building a business and not really caring about the people on it. Whether they Change out, you know, if I'm, you know, swapping people out left and right, I guess I wouldn't really care about that. But that's not who I am. And I don't think that's anybody who's listening to the show. You'd be listening to somebody else if that's who you were. For me, I look at this as God's opportunity. I look at this as a responsibility to God, that this business changes lives and that it impacts people that you know, doing the show, I've been doing this show for so many years, while just 10 years alone in this business. And, man, I mean, the impact that we've seen it have is the reason we continue to do this over and over and over again, is to push out all this free content, so that people can change their lives so that they can help others grow as well. So some things to look at number one, when someone you serve grows out of selfishness and serves the good of others, you are a successful builder. Number two, when someone you lead gains more responsibility, including the respect of their team, you're a successful builder. And what do I mean by the respect of their team, I'm not talking about that this is somebody who's looking at themselves as amazing, you know, an incredible person, Oh, you, you should respect me. In fact, let me push really hard against the concept that because you have a title, you deserve respect, you do not deserve respect. I do believe in the old adage that you earn respect. And if I have not earned the respect of my team, then I can't command their respect or, just believe that they're going to do it for no great reason. Or because I have a title. The title doesn't mean squat, folks. One of the things we used to say back in youth ministry all the time is, is kids don't care how much you know until they know how much you care. The title doesn't mean anything. If I know that you actually care about me that you're going to do something that you plan on helping me to grow, that you plan on helping me be successful and you know, reach some of the goals that I have, hey, I will respect you. If I see that you respect me, then I can respect you, right? So just be thinking along those lines. When I say that, what that means is, is that you've done something to earn that number three when someone you inspire goes on to do more than they thought they were capable of. You're a successful builder. So the exciting thing is that some folks will grow out of their current role and into leadership. So here's my question. Is it worth it? I will tell you, it is absolutely worth it. I love what John Maxwell says a quote that I have used of his for cheese decades, probably getting John and myself here. Would you rather spend money on growing your team members, and they leave with the money you spent, or don't spend money, and they stay? Think about that. Now, John points out that great leaders like those in the top 1% of leadership positions have something in common.

They know that acquiring and keeping good people is a top priority. So here's my question to you. Is that a top priority for you? I'm not gonna lie. It is not easy. In fact, it's not only tough, but in having led, you know, led people for over three decades now. I can tell you, it's getting tougher to find quality people. It's getting tougher to find good people that are worth keeping. Praise God, we have got a solid team. But I will tell you, we had to go through many people to get to this solid of a team. And one of the toughest things for me, one of the things I absolutely hate is an entitlement, people who think you should be paying them because they breathe. We have gone through a bunch of people in roles, that apparently the role just tend to draw this type of person who believes you should just pay them incredible amounts of money. And if they accomplish something great, but if they don't, so what they deserve to be paid. Folks, I will tell you, it is It's tough. It's tough, finding people who want to actually work nowadays, much less be great at what they do. So guess what? It's going to take time. It's going to take your time to teach them to train them to delegate properly to them. And if you don't spend time in making them great, then what's gonna happen you're gonna have these folks stay on your team, in the role they're in with the level of excellence or the level of productivity that they currently have. Well, I'm sorry, that's just not good enough for me, I want people to grow, I want them to get better, because we have a lot to do, and we have a lot of lives to change. So if somebody just stays at the same level, I'm going to struggle with that. Because it means that they're not doing a great job and growing, and it means that our leadership team is not doing a great job in getting them there. Now, ultimately, at the end of the day, if somebody does not want to grow, if they refuse to grow, they're probably not going to stand our team very long. Because that's not the kind of team that we operate. So another thing is, it's going to take resources. Yes, yes, yes, it's gonna take money. Sorry. But guess what, you know, as a group of, you know, as a company that coaches people, people pay us to help them have better leaders, better teams, all that stuff, we pay people to help us in the areas that we need help. I've been doing that for a really long time. I mean, it's got to be decades by now that I've been paying people to help me, my team, my company, and our weak spots.

Not only do I do it in the business, but do it in my personal life as well. Why? Because I have come to a place of understanding that if I get the right coach, in my corner, if I get the right people in my corner, I become better. I can grow. So it's going to take resources, it's going to take assets, it's probably going to take technology to get people better, you're just going to have to find those things that make them better. You know, many times I help entrepreneurs and business owners and leaders understand, you may have done something incredibly well, without any technology. There's been many things I've done in the past, and then hired somebody to do it. And they couldn't do it as well as I could. And as I sat down with them going, Hey, what's the struggle? They're like? Well, I, I need this piece of technology, I need the software program like, Hmm, interesting. I've never used that software program. And then I plug it in for them. And they do the thing I was doing, only they do it better, to do better than I did. Which makes me wonder, why didn't I use that software program? But the key is not everybody's going to do it the same way you do. And if they can do it better than you praise God, hallelujah. This is what we're looking for. We want them to be better than us, right? That's the goal. We want to duplicate ourselves and then help them to become better than us. So yes, it's going to take resources, it's going to take time, it'll take the right things. But gosh, guys, you already know this, Is anything worth doing? And this is worth doing is gonna take time and effort and definitely resources. I love what Bo McDonald, a client of ours said to me once when he started implementing, killing the leadership, crazy cyclists. We got a call. He said, Man, I've been leading others for three whole days and I'm exhausted. He's like, why didn't I spend more time killing the leadership Crazy Cycle before? Now, this is so much better. And it was so great to have this conversation and say, What are you noticing? What are you experiencing and everything came down to I can do so much more now. Because I'm actually focusing on making other people great leading other people to success. So I'm gonna tell you, it's worth it. It's so worth it. And there's more than just, you know, what I'm discussing right now the bonus is, is that the more we grow our team members, the more we will grow our bottom line. If we are duplicating ourselves unless you're just running a business that doesn't make any money if you're duplicating in the processes that should absolutely grow your bottom line. So it's worth it now why don't more leaders do it? Well, most leaders like Bo was, are still caught in the leadership Crazy Cycle, right? That was one of the best things for him to get out of. And so many of our other leaders have followed this process as well. If you're still stuck in the leadership Crazy Cycle, then man it is going to jack up any attempt at making other people great. It's definitely going to jack up any attempt at making other leaders. So we've got whole episodes teaching on this.

So we're not going to go into that here. But you've got to go to past episodes to get this leadership Crazy Cycle is a huge trap that will absolutely hold you back. In fact, if that's where you are, then you need to get to our Next-Level Leadership Live event. The fact is that the more effective you become as a leader, the more effective your team becomes, which means the more your business will grow with less stress. If you're ready to take a huge leap forward in your leadership capability, then you absolutely need to check out our Next-Level Leadership Live event coming up this April. Now registration is open and seats are selling out so don't put this off. The keynote lessons are geared to equip you to build high-performing teams to cultivate excellence in every corner of the business and grow your revenues. We're teaching truly transformative lessons during this event, and you won't want to miss them. So sign up today at Chrislocurto.com/events. And get ready for growth. Once again, go to Chrislocurto.com/events to take your business to the next level. Alright, let's get back to what's keeping you from investing in others. Now, here are a few more reasons that leaders won't invest in making new leaders. Number one, this is one of the toughest things. So before you just go, well, that's not me, I really want you to search yourself. Number one is giving up control. Now, some people hear that and they go, Oh, I don't have a problem with other people doing other things. That's not what we're talking about here. We're talking about the control that you have over things working the way you think they should. working properly, you know, sharing. Some people think of sharing power, you know, or responsibility.

The thing is, what we're really, really talking about here is that leaders can feel out of control when they give ownership to someone else. Now, a lot of times you will hear me teach about making sure that your team has ownership making sure that they have to buy in Sometimes people hear that and freak out. They're like, What do you mean ownership? No, we're not talking about ownership of your actual business, we're talking about owning their roles. You set them up for success so well, that they know exactly what they're doing. They take ownership of that role, they run with it, they make it happen, and they're not constantly coming to you every five seconds to ask you questions or find out what they should be doing. They know what they're supposed to be doing. And they do it. So that is a valuable thing to make sure that you've got team members that are owning their roles. But sometimes people can feel like this causes them to feel out of control, and right leaders can feel useless or in the way if others are being more productive. This is such a big fallacy that so many leaders have is that if they make somebody successful at doing something that they were doing, then they're not going to be needed. It is so difficult to get leaders to a place of understanding. There is so much more your company needs from you than what you're doing right now. Oh, Chris, I just can't imagine I mean, what else would I do? Just stick with us, we'll teach you that stuff will teach you how to lead even greater, even higher levels when we have not only in the Next Level Mastermind program, we've got killing leadership Crazy Cycle, but we've got the follow-up. Here's what you do. When you've done that. Here's how you lead people to success after you've done it right? You're not useless. You're not somebody standing around not doing anything. Instead, as you get things off of your plate and make other people great. More things pop up, or you get better training on the things that you need to be focusing on. And that's what we help people to discover, right? So don't feel useless or you're not going to have anything to do. You're going to have a lot to do. Another thing is leaders can feel a loss of self-worth when they're not in control of everything. Well, if I'm not the one who's leading all of this to succeed, then I just don't feel worthy. I don't feel good enough, guys, your worth is not in you doing it. I do not run my businesses. I haven't since the beginning. In the beginning, it was me. You know, you've probably heard me talking about Brian Alex, who came along and helped me out in the very beginning. But after I started bringing on quality people and putting them in roles and getting things off of my plate, the team has run the businesses, right? I don't run a business, I lead leaders. And those leaders lead other leaders, and they those leaders lead team members. And so we have this phenomenal process of having people run the business, not Chris. Because if I had to do it all, I just wouldn't do it. There's too much to get done. I need phenomenal people who are doing it. So I can go on and do things like this, spend time doing this. Right? Spend time creating content, doing shows doing next-level life strap plans, and all that kind of stuff, right? So number two reason why so many leaders won't invest time is the empowering of others to do the work, which is giving them the tools that they need to succeed. A huge limiting factor is that a lot of leaders don't know how to empower others. So in other words, there's a lot of leaders out there who want to, they just don't know how they don't know what tools are needed in order to succeed at this role. They're just too removed. And this is a another fallacy that people think, I don't even know how that person does that job, how am I going to help them to do it better, I don't even do that job. They're doing that job way better than I am. Here's the great thing about leading, you don't have to know how to do the job to help somebody be better at it.

Let me say it again, you don't have to know how to do the job. To help somebody be better at it, the goal of a great leader is to discover the things that are holding that team member back. Help them to find those pieces, and then solve those with them for them. Right, don't just come in and tell them, here's what you're going to do differently. And this is going to solve everything, because that rarely ever works. Instead, help them to discover the things that are keeping them from being better. And then solve those pieces for them. A lot of leaders are afraid that they're gonna mess up, or they're gonna make mistakes, or even look foolish as they try to help somebody else, be better at their work, or empower them to do their work better. Maybe you have, maybe haven't built the trust necessary to really empower those under you, maybe you're feeling like, you know, I don't have that relationship. That's okay. Let's work on that. Right? What do we need to do to get that relationship up? How do we get them to trust us, maybe you don't show appreciation or recognise others for doing the great work that they're doing, or the good work that they're doing? Well, these are things that we need to start doing. It is amazing how much the old saying, people repeat what they're rewarded for is true. It is so true. And for a lot of leaders, especially business owners, we find it really difficult to tell people what they're doing right, we don't have a problem telling them the things that they're doing wrong, we can see the things you're doing wrong and tell them, hey, you need to fix this. But for many business owners, it's a struggle to actually tell somebody that they're doing something right. Not because they don't want to. It's because their brains are not focused on that at the time. A lot of business owners and I was guilty of this in my early days, I can tell you that many entrepreneurs and business owners and even leaders have this bad concept, I pay you a paycheck, that should be the pat on the back that you need. I wish that were true. But we are emotional beings. And people like to hear that they're doing a good job. The crazy thing is when you become better at telling them that they're doing a good job, instead of telling them that they're doing a bad job, you will see them do a lot more things than you would like them to do. It will be surprising how much better they do. Now, the number three reason why a lot of leaders don't do this or struggle with this is giving up things that they enjoy the parts of the job that they like, folks, I get this early on in my leadership career. I mean, early decades ago, I was doing some things that I absolutely loved. And I spent some time trying to figure out how I was going to grow my team. And one of the things that kept smacking me in the face is that I was doing some things, some speaking engagements, believe it or not, that

I had to let go of, I had to get rid of these things and train somebody else up to do it. Because if I kept spending my time on that, then I couldn't spend time on my team. And so, man, I had to give up some of the things that I was really loving to do. You may have to find that thing that you're not going to get to do anymore, because it's the thing that's keeping you from helping people be better. Here's the crazy thing. Do you think it stopped my teaching and speaking career? Not at all, believe it or not, it opened up new opportunities for me to continue to teach and help people and grow people. So getting the pieces off of my plate that I really enjoyed back in that time, actually opened it up for me to do bigger, better things. And so I had helped other people step up into great roles, not even realizing it was pushing me to higher heights if you will. Another thing is maybe you got into your business to make widgets. But now you can't scale because you're behind a workbench making one widget at a time. If that's you if you're stuck doing so much of the work, what's gonna change that? What's gonna get you out and get somebody else in there making the widgets so you can lead people to success Chris, we don't make enough widgets to make enough money. Well, we're gonna have to step this up a piece at a time then. Right?

Maybe you have to work with some part-time folks. Or maybe you have some people on your team so you can start delegating some of the more money-making items so that you can step into other areas. You can figure this out. You just have to make the decision. Isn't that probably the right direction to go, right? Another thing is maybe you can't get out of your own way so that others can take your place. Oh, I don't like that phrase, Chris, take my place. What are you saying, guys? Trust me, you listen to the show because you hear me giving advice and information that you feel like works. If you get out of the way, you will become more valuable to your own team, and to your own company. If you stay in the way, nobody's going to be able to take on the things that you're doing. And you're going to be responsible for the 10,000 things you do every single day. So get out of the way, and help empower. And let me add this about empowering others to empower means to give power or authority, essentially, to authorize but it can also mean to draw power, energy, or enthusiasm out of someone. So think about it. You ever play sports in school, maybe had a coach who challenged you? Maybe you had a math or science teacher, maybe they encourage you to really study, I think we all have somebody, maybe it was a music teacher who truly inspired you, or maybe mentored you to push me I think we all had somebody, hopefully, everybody listening had somebody in their life that empowered you to succeed to move up to the next level to grow. While the truth is that it's actually harder to lead others than to just do the work yourself. Think about it, think about the coach trying to get you to run the specific play or the teacher who could have just solved the problem on their own, or the music lesson that was painful for both you and the music teacher. Think about these people, right? They didn't have to do those things. They could have just done those things on their own right? Well, obviously, not in teaching and having a team. But the problem is, is that until you replicate yourself in others, you are the primary limiting factor of your team. You are the leader. You're the one holding them back until you do this. So the solution is that when you focus on leading others to success, you can finally break out of this cycle and get ahead of the curve. When you get out of the way, you can grow, you can scale, and you can succeed at a much greater level. So when we come back, identify and cultivate other people into the leader that we think they can be.

Joel Fortner 32:50
Hey, it's Joel Fortner. Here, I'm the vice president of leadership development on Chris's team and I oversee our Next-Level Mastermind business coaching program. Most business owners and leaders lack a clear path to succeed in business. They question whether they're making the right decisions and if they're focusing on the right things to really grow their business. If this is you, you need a coach in your life. coaches help you make better decisions, navigate uncertainty lead more effectively, and grow your business without sacrificing your life and your family. In their first year, our clients typically see an average of 67% increase in gross revenue and an average of 138% increase in net profit and regained hours of time. Our clients stay in the program for over three and a half years simply because of the results they get. So if you're ready to run your business at the next level and see the growth you've been wanting, then visit Chrislocurto.com/mastermind. Again, Chrislocurto.com/mastermind today.

Chris LoCurto 33:52
Okay, so it's time to get real here. Let's get down to the nitty-gritty of developing new leaders. Now I want to give you a couple of things to ask yourself about a potential leader that you've identified as a candidate on your team right? Now, here's the fundamental question. Do not ever put somebody in a leadership role or even consider a person until you answer this question. And guys, I'm telling you, this is the thing that will cause you to make lots of failures in your leadership career. If you cannot answer this question, what makes me think this person can actually lead that can actually become a leader what potential do I see in them? What makes me think that they can lead other people to success? So I love using this great example because I think so many people can relate to this. You know, one of the biggest mistakes that so many leaders and companies make is taking their best salesperson and making them a Sales Team Leader, because oh my gosh, this person can sell like crazy. They've done such an incredible job. Surely they can lead other people to success by doing the same thing. What in the world made you think that they can lead other people to success? Have you seen them? Do it? Have you seen them help other salespeople become better? Well, if they're your best salesperson, then the answer is most likely, unequivocally No. Of course, you've not seen them lead other people to success, because otherwise, how would they be your top salesperson, the amount of time it takes to make a salesperson great, makes it where you can't keep selling. And being a top salesperson, you just can't. And if anybody says, oh, no, you can, then I can promise you, that person is either not doing a good job and leading people to success, or they're taking sales from their team. Because it takes a lot of time to make a person who's a salesperson great at selling unless you just hired all these amazing people and the person actually isn't leading them to success. They're just sitting there making all their sales calls. Either way, it's still accurate. You can't just lead people to succeed and be great at doing the thing that you're doing. Does the question have to be what makes the person great at leading other people to success? Right? So before you ever put anybody in a role as a leader, make sure that you can answer that question what makes me think that they're going to be a great coach, that they're going to be a great mentor, that they're going to lead people and always see things in this person that they may not see in themselves, what is telling me that this person is going to help you know, one team member much less five or even more, to have better qualities in their will sales or whatever their role is have better aptitudes have better potential, right. A great leader identifies these things, and then they spend time and the effort necessary and maybe the resources as well to draw it out of us.

My best teachers, mentors, coaches, and leaders in life, are not the ones that told me what to do. They were not the ones who hired me and told me that I was supposed to make something successful and then left. They were the ones that came along and saw things in me and pulled those pieces out. And then helped me to become a better version of those things. When you do that, when you have somebody like that in your life then the other person becomes successful. So if you're going to define a great leader, or you're going to identify a great leader on your team, you've got to ask the question, what makes me think that they have the right qualities to lead somebody else to success? The second question I want you to have is, do they even want to be a leader, this is super important, I violated this in my early leadership career. You don't want to push somebody out too early toward leadership. Because if they've not discovered that they want to be in it for themselves, then there's a really good chance that they are going to self-sabotage if you keep pushing them. So there are two types of people on your team that you need to identify of them, the roleplayers, those that do great at being in a role and doing what the role is, and the growth leaders, those that want to grow. That wants to help you that wants to help others. If you can identify those roles, then we can do a great job at creating the right types of teams. But again, let me go back to saying this. In my early career, I could see that people had potential, and I would push on said people because I did not realize that they weren't ready for it. And because they didn't want to disappoint me they ended up self-sabotaging. After doing that to people 20 years ago, I realized I'm the one who was sucking. And so instead of pushing people to lead, I started suggesting or pointing certain things out that I could see about that person that they could do that I could see them accomplishing something. So make sure that you're not pushing people into this leadership role. Guide directly help them to see stuff, but if it's not their choice, do not put in there. So what do you want to look for? Well, sometimes growers find do my air quotes here. They're the kind of people who are frustrated in their role, you know, and by frustrated, I don't mean they hate their role. My role sucks. What I'm saying is sometimes they can be looking for more they feel like they've accomplished the role well or they might even be struggling with other leaders because they're seeing things that aren't being done correctly. So sometimes you're looking for somebody who might even be in conflict with other leaders. We don't want them to be in conflict with other leaders. But perhaps they're seeing that something could be better, it can be done better can be done with more excellence. Just because somebody's pushing back does not mean that they are somebody who should be a leader. In fact, you might discover that there's somebody who absolutely sucks at it, they may just be entitled and struggling with their own personal issues.

So again, don't hear this and go, Oh, somebody's pushing back on leaders, they're supposed to be a leader. That is not what I'm saying at all. What I'm saying is, is that if you find somebody who's wanting to take ownership, or grow something, and they can see a better way of doing that, or there's at least there's some struggle internally, that is possibly going to make that better, this is a great time to start digging in and seeing if they're the right person. Now, obviously, they need to mature their leadership skill set, if this is what you're experiencing, and this isn't everybody, this just maybe something that you see. So we need a majority, obviously. But this may be some of their potential trying to find its way out. So I'm just putting this in there. As a side note, hopefully, you're looking at people seeing the people that are rising to the top because they're making other people successful, naturally, they might not even be pointing out that they want a leadership role. They're just doing a great job. And getting people there naturally. Great, fantastic. But what you also may discover is the person that they're immature in leading right now, but you can see some of the frustrations coming out because they want something to be better than it currently is. So if so then jump in there, and see if you can't draw some leadership stuff out. Now follow-up questions. How are you empowering those who want to grow? What steps are you taking with them? What steps are you taking to lead them to develop their own skills to master their current role, don't put somebody you know, if they've not mastered the current role, and how do you know, they're gonna make other people be great, maybe they're, maybe they're only going to do you know, help somebody else get 3040 50% into being great at that role, right. So, again, we're not saying they have to be a master at a role to lead people to success. But if you're pulling somebody from an area that's showing leadership capabilities, and showing that they can lead other people to success, then ask the question, do they actually know how to do the job that they're doing really well? Are you getting them more training? Are you getting them more resources? Are you helping them to help others to succeed by giving them the opportunities, one of the things I've always loved doing is not telling somebody what I'm doing, I just put them in a position and say, Hey, I'd love for you to help this person do this better, you know, help put them in roles, where I can see if they can lead somebody to success. And the great thing is, if the right person, you'll see it, you'll see if they can make somebody else successful, you'll see it in the other person if they appreciate how well that person did.

So many times, that's one of the things that I will do is, instead of telling somebody, I'm thinking about them for leadership, in fact, I highly suggest you don't let that cat out of the bag until you're positive with this person. Because another thing is you can let people down if you discover man, they suck. They can't be a great leader. And then you're like, oh, sorry about that. I guess I shouldn't have talked to you about that. Instead, you know, check and see, put them in situations, see if they can lead other people to success. Now, what else are you doing to give them more and more ownership of that area? Are you doing things to see if they will take on more ownership and run with it? How well are they owning and delivering on the things that you're asking from them? You know, have they earned the respect of other leaders and team members? Right? Take a look at the other leaders and ask yourself this question. If my leaders and if I trust my leaders, I know my leaders are doing a great job. Do they respect this person? You know, can I see them agreeing or you know, ask the question, what do you think about this person as a potential leader? What are you seeing in them? That would tell you that they could lead people to success right? Do you see other people coming to this person for help? That is usually a good telltale sign for me, you know unless you have just lazy people. I like to see people who I consider to be good or great workers coming to another team member for guidance. If they feel that trust factor there if they feel like they can go and seek out some help. That usually is a good sign for me. So people need to be led. They need to be taught. They need mentoring. They need coaching. They need guide

And, and if you're going to do those things, and you're going to help them to do those things, then you must start by killing the leadership Crazy Cycle. So if you're going to help other people be great at being leaders, you've got to kill the leadership Crazy Cycle. But if you have killed the leadership Crazy Cycle, but leaders that you are trying to make great, or leaders on your team, if they are stuck in the leadership Crazy Cycle, then you've got to help them get out of it too. Right? You cannot expect somebody under you to lead people under them to succeed if they're stuck in the leadership Crazy Cycle just like you were. So do everything you can to help them through that process. That's why we love our key leader's program. Because we're not just helping the top leaders, we're helping those lower level leaders or next level leaders, just depends on where they are on the business to actually get out of that as well and become great. So maybe some of you are still thinking but Chris, if I spend all this time and energy developing leaders, what did they leave me? What if they do? The question shouldn't be what if they leave me the question should be what if I don't spend this time and energy and they stay? Right? Would you rather leave everyone on your team in the same position they're in right now? I have lost team members that I've put lots of resources into. I have lost leaders that I have put lots of money and effort into. But I've had to go through certain processes to actually weed out those who weren't gonna stay and be phenomenal. And I will tell you right now I have one of the strongest teams I've ever had in decades of leading people. And I love it. And how much energy and effort has gone into this team, a tonne. And it doesn't stop, we haven't stopped. We continue to push forward as much as we can and help people to become great. So cultivate leaders, this is your job, and this should be your craft.

What do we call it? Leader? Ship? Right. So let me push a little bit more here. You should be asking things of yourself like this. Am I making sure that everyone else has the resources they need? How do I make sure that everyone else is focused on doing the right things? How do I make sure that we're staying on target and on timelines? How do I make sure that we're continuing to push vision to the team? What are the strategies that I'm currently missing in my business? am I focusing on others and their interests are only on my own agenda? And what can I do for my team that they cannot do for themselves? Folks, if you'll put into practice what we're teaching, I promise you, I promise you that you're going to grow strong leaders who are going to help you with the company's success. So maybe you've just been putting this into practice. Maybe you're doing this already. And you've got some strong leaders emerging on your team. What should you do next? Well, we're gonna talk about that in part three of cultivation, which is coming up soon. Well, that's all the time that we have for today. As always, we want you to take this information. You want to change your leadership. We want you to change your business. We want you to change your life. And join us on the next episode.