Challenging Assumptions About Culture

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That has to happen sometimes. I think that also means you have to change.

The outlook that people have, the attitude that people have, the people have to change. If you're gonna change the culture

it's Hey, there, I am Kate Vollman, and this is Lead With Culture. Today, we are talking about culture. We want you to think a little bit differently about culture, and I am joined by our, director of coaching, Tony Ferraro.

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which leads me to, a point, what's one of the things we always talk about and Matthew Kelly says this quite a bit when it comes to answering a question.

What's one thing you can do?

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We always see this in training, whether we're doing coaching with an executive or we're actually doing training with a company. Before we start to talk about, what culture is, we have to ask 'em the other question

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culture is.

not?

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We see all these articles out there of all these organizations and companies that are talking about, we give unlimited vacation days and we bring in lunch every day for our team members, and we have sleep pods and bring your dog to work and all of these. Perks. while perks are great and no one's gonna say no to a great perk, but,

that's not culture. those are niceties. Those are things that you can do for your people. And that's great, but that's actually not what creates the culture of your organization. And a culture is really.

Those systems and values and expectations, behaviors, and beliefs that increase or decrease in organization's, chances of fulfilling its mission To say it more simply, is the heart of an organization. It is how do people feel when they're coming to work?

How do they feel about. Doing work together and working towards a mission. And you see the culture not only in the people, but also you feel the culture, the customers feel the culture, we see that every day in the products and the services.

and the companies that we really love, we feel the way that their employees are feeling because that's how they're treating the customers that are coming in and, doing business with them.

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We don't challenge the premise of the question when it comes up. So what I saw recently, which leads to, the point of the conversation here today is, I came across something that really challenged. The premise of a question, and here it is, and so it, it maybe in an unlikely spot, but I've been following, with some interest.

Dion Sanders, coach Prime took over at Colorado Football and he's a football coach at the University of Colorado. Now, to give you some idea, Dion Sanders was a, unprecedented, athlete in his time. He actually played a professional football game and a professional baseball game on the same day.

He was just next level. Totally,out there in terms of, athletic ability and, he has since become a coach and had a great turnaround at a historically black college and a lot of press around that. And then accepted a job at, the University of Colorado. Now, to give you an idea, the University of Colorado, there are 131, college football programs, division one,college football programs

Colorado, they do a power rankings 1 0 3 outta 1 31. and one 30 one's the worst, they were, 128 outta 1 31 in winning percentage. They were, 120 seventh outta 1 31 in offense, and they were dead last 1, 31 outta 1 31 on defense. he had a bunch of opportunities to go someplace, and he chose Colorado, with the mission and he was very clear from the beginning of winning games of.

Turning that thing around and it's just a monumental task. But I have been fascinated to kinda watch the process that goes along. And the other day I read someone asked him about culture something.

I agree. Changing the culture at Colorado he said, I don't care about culture. 'because they brought in a lot of new players and how are they getting along And he said, We're here to win games.

Now, people took that a bunch of different ways, I went back and read the article and he was really talking about this idea of, you know, how are the players getting to know each other and he went on to say, look, I've been on some teams where the quarterback didn't even like the receiver.

but they darn sure made harmony when the ball was snapped. But his point there was like, look, we're after one thing the one thing is to win. And if we do the right things, it's gonna create the culture around that.

It's all those things that are gonna help us, to win. then I got really intrigued by this. People are going crazy about, you know what he's saying I said, no, let me, try to apply this to, the six immutable principles we always try to teach with, forming a dynamic culture.

that's where I was headed with this conversation. and the point there was a challenging, the premise is, it doesn't always look the way we think it looks. That's number one. And number two is, there are some principles that go across all of different organizations, right?

We work with a lot of different people and a lot of different groups. And, what do we say about people? people are people. So, You're coaching a lot of different people. We're training a lot of different people. there are similarities in the fundamentals, across organizations, right.

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And for him it's winning. think about it, in business we wanna win in life, we wanna win. And so if we're gonna accomplish anything, there's certain principles that are gonna help everybody collectively get there. And so it's so interesting when, he was like, culture doesn't matter

Then he goes on and describes all the things that he's doing to win. And that is exactly what culture is. He's basically describing the six immutable principles and the first and the second principle being mission is king. for them it's all about

getting the ball, it's about winning. And so everyone on the team knows that is what we are here to do, even when they lose the game. They don't lose sight on the fact that we are here to win and that's what we will keep doing. And so everyone is working towards that. And so it's fascinating that he's culture doesn't matter, but everything he's doing is culture.

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That when we talk about everything towards winning or everything about being profitable, that we're talking about being ethical and we're talking about, doing things within the framework of rules This isn't a win at all cost where you sell your soul.

if we start with that premise that we're gonna do things, within the parameters of. ethics and what's legal and all those sorts of things, because then we're talking about everything we can do in winning. So basically here's my run of the six principles and see if this makes sense with what I see at Colorado.

the first principle is making culture a priority. So even though he said, I don't accept what you think is culture, but from day one,

He even said, We're going there, we're going to compete, and we're going to be great. for everything that we do, whether it's, in the classroom, on the field, the people that we are, everything that we do, we're gonna shoot.

the culture was the number one priority. that's the way we're gonna get there by changing what's going on, Then as you alluded to the second principle, mission

is king.

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It was so fascinating all the questions that he was getting asked. And when we think about May culture a priority, somebody asked him a question about how their team's mindset is probably changed and how do you get the mindset back in season? And he was like, what are you talking about?

No, my people always have the mindset of winning. it never goes away. It's always this same mindset. And I thought that was so interesting because. It's true, right? Like in life, in business, in sports, you might not be at the level that you're working at when you're training and doing certain things, but the mindset has to be there.

We have to feed our minds every single day. If you went for months on end and you weren't feeding yourself content, if you weren't being motivated, if you weren't getting coached, if you weren't focusing on those different areas of your life, think about how much can fall apart in only a matter of weeks or months.

You don't just get back in the game to have that mindset. I thought that was really interesting and how it's so important to make culture a priority, not only in. The game, but in, your life, like how important that is to keep that number one.

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us

it's so easy to make a decisions at that point. from the get go, he just, never wavered off what he was saying. And then that leads us into the second principle of mission being king.

Everything is around. The mission of winning and he's a huge star, but he actually does a pretty good job. of steering things away from him. And what I mean by that is he's very clear about, this is not about me.

this is what we're about and this is actually than me.

every ounce of energy we have to have towards winning. And if I don't think that gets us there, we're not doing that. Because one of the things that a leader's role is, the allocation of scarce resources. And time, for example, is an extremely scarce resource. What are you spending your time on? Any meeting you have, any activity you're doing at your company that's not getting you towards your bottom line is a dereliction of your duty, if you will, of allocating scarce resources.

So I just think he's so dialed in on that. But then that's when I got going and thought, okay, I wonder if I can put the six principles the next one. Number three, over-communicate the plan. whether you like Deion Sanders or you don't like Deion Sanders, I don't think anybody would say he is underexposed or he has undercommunicated his plan.

He's got three or four different social networks going. Every place he goes, there's a camera falling, and he has his own production company. As a matter of fact, when he got hired, he said, look, I know you do things at the university promotion wise, but my company's gonna handle most of the football stuff because there's a way he wants things communicated they're so diligent about communicating it the same way, making sure the message is the same

And sometimes we. don't always do that when we're in an organization or we make that tragic mistake of assuming that people know what we want because we may have said it once and we know that doesn't work out.

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And we often will tell people until your team members are almost mocking you in the sense of they're saying things before you even get to saying them. You haven't said it enough. that's what I love so much about,any really great leader. It's, very clear and it's very consistent. The same thing.

People don't doubt what this person stands for, believes in where they're going because they're saying the same thing over and over. And we see this, obviously when it comes to marketing. you have to. See an ad or, something online about seven times before someone will decide to actually make a purchase or to buy something.

And so it's the same thing with the people,that we're communicating with. Sometimes people need to hear it one or 5, 7, 10, 20 times before they're like, oh, I finally got that. Which sounds so ridiculous. But when you think about it, how often have you heard a message over and over and then all of a sudden one day you're like, It kind of clicks in a way that you'd never thought before.

Repetition is a leader's friend.

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They mean what they're saying and they believe it.

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One is pretty straightforward, like coaches, for example. So he went out and found,what he deemed the absolute best coaches for their mission. one of their offensive coordinator was a head coach at another college and chose to leave a head coaching job to become an assistant at Colorado.

So when you talk about hiring with rigorous discipline, hiring the best people that you can, he went out and searched for the people that, fit what he wanted to do. That were on the same page and were very good at what they did So that was a big part of that.

And then from a player standpoint, you do kind of hire players because you recruit them. now it's very controversial. there was some, rules in this particular time allow you to clear a roster there's only like 15 players coming back from last year.

so there's a big turnover there in the players. And it was interesting because he also made this quote, you can't change the culture without changing the people. I think that can mean two things. That can mean sometimes, you can't change the culture without physically changing the people.

That has to happen sometimes. And we know that when we're coaching with leaders, it's the hardest decision that people make So sometimes you have to actually change the people themselves. I think that also means you have to change.

The outlook that people have, the attitude that people have, the people have to change. If you're gonna change the culture, And he went on to say, look, the folks that resist change could care less about the people affected because their concern is how they're affected.

So if you're not all on board, you're actually being selfish. You're going after your mission instead of the mission, you're making yourself king rather than the mission, the king. So he's definitely done a job of hiring the right people, getting the right players, or doing the best,he possibly could at effort of making that the case.

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And it's the same thing with us,with leaders. Like we have to do that. And it can be really hard because sometimes we don't wanna, let certain people go because. they're really great people and it's challenging to, let someone go. But when we're so focused on mission and if somebody is not either a cultural fit or they are not able to perform the mission of their role, we have an opportunity to do two things.

We have to decide, hey, where else can this person go in the organization? 'cause we love them and they are a good cultural fit, but they're not doing the job. Where else could they potentially go or and we see this in some organizations when they're not a cultural fit and they're not even really great at their job.

and we keep those people around, they're not happy, obviously, because who's happy not being able to. Fulfill the mission of their role, and they're not helping fulfill the mission of the organization. And so as leaders, we have to make those tough decisions. And it's so interesting because we see this all the time, how many people will keep a team member on board that they don't even want to keep around?

because then I have to go hire someone and find someone. And that's really difficult.

But think about all of the energy and time and resources that are being wasted day, and month, and sometimes even years when you're letting the wrong people stay within the organization. So we have to look at it from that both sides of you're hiring with rigorous discipline and you're also making sure everyone on that team is living and breathing the values, and they do believe in the mission of the organization.

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and either you don't care about the culture, to do something about that, or you're letting that person languish. So what we think is being compassionate for people, other folks on our team think you're actually just tolerating them their opinion of you is how you deal with people.

Goes down when you think it goes up because you're keeping someone around. So you made a great point there, Kate, and then, letting people know what to expect again. his first meeting with, his team went viral you know, he pretty much said, most of you aren't gonna be able to play here.

and so that was, the controversial part, but all along the line, if you listen and watch it's just very clear, this is what I expect of you and this is the level of commitment we expect.

And if you're not, at a place where you can honor that commitment, then. personally, this isn't gonna fit it's not gonna work out. So from day one, he's been very upfront, this is what we are about and these are the people that'll be here. and again, some people viewed that as harsh, but actually, I mean, you look at the opposite of letting some people stay around who had no chance of being in his plans.

Actually what happened is everybody had a chance to go somewhere else 'cause you can transfer now, or it's important to know the university guaranteed all their scholarships. Even if they weren't playing football, they could still go to the school for free if they didn't find another place.

you can't do the work that we need to do. You were 131 out of 131,Clearly, something, is not working there.

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It means whatever it is that the coach is sharing with their team of what's expected of them. And so everyone knows. Whether they're winning or losing. So when someone's on your team, everyone on your team deserves to know what's expected of them. your team should know when they're going home from the office or at their dinner table.

because they're working from home. we should all know what winning looks like, even if Financially things aren't maybe going so well, but what does winning look like as a whole, so that people can feel good about the role that they're in, even during challenging times.

I think that's really important for leaders to be very clear. This is what I expect of you. these are the expectations that need to be met. you are either going to give it your all and do what's expected of you or you're not those are the two options, but you have to know.

What you're working towards so that you can feel that level of comfort and know like, I'm, doing what is expected of me, and I'm very clear on that.

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They have chips in 'em and the shirts they wear underneath have these chips. So they're measuring things like miles per hour you're running,

So instead of just guessing you have your times that you're supposed to be running. and a lot of these cases, it's up on a big scoreboard.

So if you're dogging it, everybody knows it. And in the weight room, most of these college weight rooms now have these screens where it measures real time output. So as you're lifting and as you're pulling a bar up and the speed and all those things, it measures against your historical performance.

You can't take a rep off. You can't not do better than you did before. everything's getting measured all the time. It's on a big scoreboard. if you're not able to handle that, then you're not gonna be able to function today. So they're clearly letting everybody know what to, expect.

It's just fascinating how they're measuring everything,

But actually it's good. The scoreboards, it's so important in training. How did I do last week? How did I do yesterday? How did I do? and what's expected? And great coaches can do that. Which leads to the last point of, create a coaching culture. One of the things that they coach Deion Sanders does a lot, is he's continually talking about mentoring people in all their areas of their lives.

You know, the coaches here have to be mentors. they've got, specialists in there and a lot of schools do this, but like in all areas of people's lives, the kids' lives,whether it's academics, the social, that they're constantly mentoring people. And I heard him, talking about.

he'll sit with somebody and say, look, when I was playing this is what I ran into. And like, he takes every opportunity to coach someone, even if it's away from, the player, the away from what they're doing. But there's clearly a coaching culture in there where he's just expecting everybody all the coaches to continually not only coaching football, but be a mentor on the type of person you are and, that everybody's continually being, coached in what they're doing.

and so you set high standards, but then you have to walk the walk with people. in business,if you're managing a team, you have to set those standards for the team, but then you actually have to coach them through it. When they're struggling and you have to not just manage the numbers, but you're not doing it, you're out.

But I've hired you because I think you can do this, and this is what we expect. And I'm gonna help coach you along the way, we always talk about the difference between a and a coach. So tell me the difference, a manager and coach,

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So those are two very different approaches that's why people, when they talk about micromanaging, it's like micromanagers feel like, I'm gonna show you how to do this one thing, and you have to do it exactly this way instead of, Hey, We're more focused on the outcome than anything else because when you hire really great people and you coach them to do their role, let them get there how they need to get there.

But by learning their work process, by learning how they think about the work that they do and how they are getting to a certain place, you can then coach them to maybe think about things a little bit differently, do their work a little bit better, and then they're getting better in their work and in their life.

And that is what people want. they want to get better. I remember,many years ago, I was a high jumper and I had never done it before and I had a coach who was teaching me how to do it, but my coach wasn't a high jumper. there was only so much that he could really coach me to get to another level 'cause he had never done it.

now in hindsight I'm like, why did they not get a coach that knew how to coach someone in this? when you have a coach that. Really knows how to push you to help you see things a little bit differently, to make sure that you're pushing yourself and really growing like that is what people crave.

they might not say that they want that, but that's what people want. Because we crave progress and we crave growth. when we're growing, we're feeling better and we're doing great work together. So we want both of those things to happen.

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What I mean by that is you could ask somebody, look, when you're talking to the people on your team, do most of your sentences end with a period or a question mark? if you're a manager, they all end with, periods, And if you're a coach, they end in questions.

Why do you think that happened? What could you do different next time? what do you think the issue is here? What's the heart of the problem? What do you want to happen? because people want to be coached. They don't want to be managed.

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question, especially after a project or something, whether, you quote unquote won or didn't. Whatever happened in the outcome. It's so important. And it's funny 'cause we keep on talking about winning and losing and so I keep, hearing Simon Sinek's voice, 'cause he wrote The Infinite Game and how he talks about how business is an infinite game.

There's no winners or losers. Like in football you have a game, there's a winner and a loser. But in, business It's infinite. there's no finite, like he describes the difference between infinite and finite. And so I think that's, just another way to look at business too, as we're talking through like a football team and then translating it into business like business. Fortunately, we can continue to grow and learn and develop and all of these things, there's no winners or losers and this is what's so great about this principle.

Number six, is having that coaching culture so that you're continuously learning, growing, getting better, and growing the business and growing your people together.

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But your point is so good is that it's, a continual process. And in a football season you may lose the first game, but what's the second game look like? And the third, are you getting better or worse? 'cause you're never staying the same.

But I think we just always have to challenge that premise of questions that we get asked learning goes on, not when we. come across things that we know, I think we get trapped into that.

We read the same things, we read the same authors, we listen to the same people, But there's a point where you have to stretch yourself and say, let me really dig into that situation. in our world right now where it's all about sound bites, can I go find out more just like you, you said, I didn't know Deion Sanders.

I went and I looked him up. that's what a winner does. That's what,somebody who really wants to improve is to find out, can I get out of my comfort zone and really see what this person's saying? there's so much wisdom that's out there if we're willing to look for it and not get trapped into the same old things that, we do.

Many of which are good and you should reinforce those. But where can we stretch ourselves Because what that does is it actually reinforces what we think is right or it challenges to think about something differently. And either one of those is a win. If you come away from somebody and say, I totally disagree that person saying now you're just building up your own conviction.

But sometimes you go, you know, there's a point to what they're saying and maybe I need to think about that a little bit more.

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like for me with sports, that's not my thing. But I appreciate listening to coaches and people that Are at the elite level of athleticism because there's a lot to be learned in the discipline and the culture and what they're doing in order to win and become the best version of themselves.

And so, looking at people, I often study comedians and I relate comedians to entrepreneurship. And so for me that's really fun to do. So think about a book that you can pick up or a podcast listen to a completely different genre of podcasts. I used to be, So hesitant to read fiction books 'cause I'm like, no, I need to learn and grow and get better.

But there's so much to learn about the human condition and people by reading great fiction. And so that is your challenge today is either listen to a podcast, a book, a magazine, something that you normally would never pick up or listen to or consume and just. Come from it from a different perspective and, see how you can relate some of the things that you're reading into your own life and, in your work and in your life in general.

SoI like that little takeaway.

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For you. so you can go to floyd coaching.com, check that out. And, let's have a conversation. We'll get on the phone with one of our coaches, and talk through where you are now, where you wanna go, and how we might be able to support you in those efforts. go to floyd coaching.com And thank you for listening. until next time, lead with culture.