Simon Brown (00:04.312)
Hello and welcome to this episode of the Curious Advantage podcast. My name is Simon Brown. I'm one of the co-authors of the book, The Curious Advantage. And today I'm here with my co-authors, Paul Ashcroft and Garrett Jones.

Paul (00:12.646)
Hi there.

Garrick (00:18.969)
Hi there.

Simon Brown (00:20.652)
And today we're delighted to be joined by Scott Blanchard.

Scott. Great to have you with us on the Curious Advantage podcast. Scott, you're CEO and co-owner of Blanchard. Can you tell us a bit more about your journey and particularly the role that curiosity played along the way in getting you to where you are now?

Blanchard (00:26.506)
Well.

Blanchard (00:47.168)
I've been with Blanchard for 31 years. I joined when I was 28, so we've been at it as a company for 46 years now. It's a business that my parents and six other colleagues from the University of Massachusetts started in the 70s as a seminar business focused on my dad's and his colleagues work around leadership.

So my journey started when I was 28 and I had been in the hospitality business before. And I joined and went to grad school and I really started out there on the front line. We referred to ourselves as road reptiles at that point. So I had days where I traveled 140, 150 days a year. my journey at Blanchard really was shaped by this incredible interest and

kind of fear of technology and what it was going to do to change this seminar business. And so it led me not only to continue to work with clients, but it led us into investments in technology in the dot-com era. In 2000, my wife and I founded a separate business called Coaching.com where we created the first ever

coach management system in 2000. So we were early. And then from there, what we continued to do, know, face-to-face training supported by training materials, we were heavily involved early in space learning using technology, referred to as blended learning. At that point, I took another departure from the business for a few years to help create a journey-based learning platform. And so the...

Simon Brown (02:18.67)
Absolutely.

Blanchard (02:43.424)
process continued. that curiosity was helpful. And what it led us to is when COVID hit in 2020, when I just taken the job as president, we didn't deliver a face to face session for 18 months. And we were doing about 30 virtual sessions a month, we were very good at technology with some clients, but we were able to, to really shift quickly. And, and it's totally changed, you know, our

our company and I was waiting, I was 25 years late, but I was waiting for that time when we would be using mediums like this on a regular basis to, you know, not only to lead and to run business, to learn how to be more effective. And at Blanchard, I say that we're ladies and gentlemen using technology to help ladies and gentlemen learn how to become better leaders leveraging and using technology. So there we are.

Paul (03:38.103)
It's quite amazing your story and the company of Blanchard, Scott.

And also how much we've now adapted to using technology that if you'd have asked us 10 years ago, people I think would have laughed and said, no, we're never gonna be delivering this type of work, particularly the type of leadership work I know you guys do in this way. To come into the point about leadership where you just left off there, you said in the past that the success of any business comes down to the quality of its leaders. And I imagine...

particularly at the moment, this is vital. We know so many companies are looking again at what does it mean to lead in their organizations. Could you just give us your view on that? What do you mean by the impact the leaders have on the success of the business?

Blanchard (04:28.672)
It's a very good question. It's a fundamental question. And while I mentioned our whole journey with technology and the curiosity around that, our fundamental vision is the same. It's leaders powered for good. And one of the things that I share with my father is this notion that it's always a leader. When good things are happening inside of an organization, there's always a leader that's in the middle of it.

or affecting it. when things fail to go as planned, there's always a leader there that either failed to act or they acted in such a way that the failure occurred. So it's really hard to divorce any success or failure from the one or the ones that are leading that effort. And we started about 20, God, it's almost 20 years ago now, which is amazing.

We spent a lot of time researching specifically not only the role that leadership plays, but how leadership works in organizations, what occurs when it succeeds, what's the chain of events that occurs, and then what happens predictably when it fails. And what's interesting with the research is it's no longer an opinion. It's really clear when leaders fail,

you know, to succeed, they create a condition where people protect themselves as human beings. And as a result, they're less able to change, they're more rooted, they're less cooperative, they don't work as hard. They put their energy into protecting themselves. And when leadership that's positive is present, people have an intention to perform, they have an intention to stay, they have an intention to cooperate with others, they support.

know, their organization of the leaders they, you know, they work for, and they bring their discretionary energy, you know, and so it's quite simple, but it's also...

Blanchard (06:39.09)
It's ironically fleeting. know, so many companies, you know, fail to see or connect the dots. And so as a result, we see in the paper all the time people that are fundamentally dissatisfied at work and they're dissatisfied for the person they work for.

Simon Brown (06:53.742)
It's interesting if people to protect themselves are less able to change, are you seeing that as counter to what's actually needed to protect ourselves, particularly if I look at some of the changes happening today, to protect ourselves as leaders we need to be more open to change than ever before. Is that the case?

Blanchard (07:15.54)
Yeah, that's the, you know, that's kind of the sick irony of everything is, is what we need. Are we need people that I do an activity on a regular basis with, with leaders and I ask them, what intentions do you expect of your people and what intentions are you fearful of? So an intention by definition, the way we define it is a, an attitude that stands up to pressure, right?

an attitude that stands up to pressure. under duress, under pressure, it's the way that people behave. We see this all the time when we travel, right? We're in a situation where the flights are being canceled, the weather's bad, and we're interacting with somebody who works for an organization. And somehow, some of them maintain composure, and they become a beacon of service in there. Even things are bad, they maintain composure.

And then we see other people that at the drop of a hat, they start to act as if, you know, the customer is wrong and they put the customer in like in their place and they have a very poor experience. And so what's interesting is as the pressure mounts, those people that are going to serve the customer, no matter what that it stands up to pressure, right? That's an intention. And so when we get into two intentions, every single time the intentions are, we want people to be able to be leaning into change. We want them to be.

interested in growth and development. We want them to be positive. We want them to be problem fixers, not just problem identifiers. We want them to be leaders and not victims. And then the things that we fear are people that tend to hide under their desks or they don't tell the truth. They're resistant to change, even if it's to the benefit of themselves. They're not cooperative.

And so everybody knows those kind of like those fundamental attitudes that we want. But what's interesting is those self-oriented attitudes, the one was where I'm protecting myself, they come fundamentally when I don't feel safe, valued, or that what I'm doing is useful. And that's laid into my relationship with my direct manager. If I don't feel safe,

Garrick (09:29.326)
Hmm.

Blanchard (09:35.828)
Physically and psychologically safe if I don't feel like I'm valued as a human being and if I don't believe that they're leading me or they're providing me with the opportunity to do things that matter Then I'm going to protect myself But if I get to a position where I do feel safe and valued and useful Then I can actually perform under pressure and I can do things This is the key is Are you able to think of others?

before you think of yourself, where you're able to think about your coworkers, about your customers, and about the needs of the organization before yourself. And if the answer is yes, that I can do something in service to the greater good, then that's somebody that's really in an optimal state at work. the manager, the leader, and the simplest way we say it is,

Blanchard (10:35.168)
Do your people believe that you have their back? Right? And what's interesting is when people behave the best under pressure, life-threatening situations, I just met with one of the directors at the San Diego police, know, law enforcement personnel in San Diego. And the big question is, will those officers behave

Garrick (10:38.49)
Mm.

Garrick (10:44.474)
Mm.

Blanchard (11:04.808)
and maintain composure under pressure? Or will they lean towards those inevitable things that cause problems?

Garrick (11:14.808)
Scott, you're talking about what we want from our people. It's such relatable content. mean, just as human beings, think that need for psychological safety is the thing that gets the best out of us. But in your view, what do you think are the fundamental things that everybody wants from work? And why do you think organizations struggle to deliver them?

Blanchard (11:40.554)
Well, the simplest answer to that, and this is from Warren Bennis, who was a great thinker. He was a peer of my father's. He was a mentor to me. I was blessed that he endorsed a book that wife and I wrote like 20 years ago, just a lovely man. And he said that it's fairly straightforward that there's three things that people need at work. The first is we come to work.

to earn an income, right? We're no longer in a agrarian society worldwide. I you need money to pay rent, to provide for your family. You we come to money to work for money, right? And so there's a transaction that's required. The second is that we go to work to feel and believe that we're productive members of our family and of our society. The notion of work.

is fundamentally good, it's fundamentally rewarding, and there's a pride that comes from having a job so you can actually be a productive member of our society. It's a great example. And it feels bad when we lose it. And then the third piece is people come to be part of something bigger than themselves, to be part of something that is more than just

them and that's when people have their connection to the vision and vision vision and mission and the values, you know of an organization and when people get to a place that they feel like they're bigger than some that they're part of something bigger than themselves. It unlocks a force of motivation intrinsic motivation that enables people to you know, engage in sacrifice and engage in selfless behavior. And what's interesting is that third piece doesn't really cost anything financially does it?

You know, it costs money to employ people, right, and to provide them with the tools and resources to do the job. But the notion of people being connected to something bigger than themselves, it's an intangible that comes from strong leadership. And it's also the thing that most often is cut off, right, that we find people that for some reason that they're disconnected with the vision and mission of the organization that's often

Blanchard (14:01.062)
aspirational and inspiring because their experience down through the organization, could cause them to feel disconnected from or not in alignment with where the organization is going. And it's why we see such exemplar behavior from people when there's a disaster, right? When bad things happen, people come together in a way that they don't in normal times.

Paul (14:27.188)
One of the most powerful questions I've heard you ask is when you're speaking with leaders, you ask, how do you add value here? You have an art of just asking very simple questions with, I think, very difficult answers to establish. But what kind of answers have you heard when you've asked those, that specific question? How do you add value here? And why do you ask that question in particular?

Blanchard (14:51.456)
Well, as context, one of the things that I'm fortunate to do is I do keynote speeches, especially for our clients, the ones that, it's oftentimes in the beginning of a leadership development initiative. And in fact, I'm preparing for one in about six weeks. And one of the things that I ask the clients is I, as I say, before I fully prepare what I'm going to talk about, I'd like to interview three

Example are leaders that you already have in your organization. Three people that are doing a great job, they're producing great results, they're creating followership, they're the people that by reputation and by results, they're just your strongest. And then sometimes I'll say, imagine they're the people that if you were able to clone them, then you wouldn't have an issue with leadership because they're doing the things that you like to do within your organization.

So it's always a bit odd. I asked them and I interviewed them, it takes 25 minutes and I basically asked them one question and the first question is, how do you personally add value to the organization? What's the value that you bring as a human being to the organization? And it's an odd question and they often say that's an interesting question, I've never been asked that. And...

And they ponder and they come up with really, really interesting answers. And then after they answer, you know, two or three things, then I'll go back to number one and I'll say, when you're doing this, what specifically are you doing? What are you thinking? What are you focusing on? And if you want, can give, can give you an example of one that I did that was, that was remarkable.

Paul (16:32.07)
Yeah, sure.

Blanchard (16:33.812)
So I was entering, there's a large fire service in the state that I live in in California, and they're one of our value clients. And before we got going with them, four or five years ago, I was speaking to the top 200 in this fire service. And I asked to speak to three of their chiefs that were gonna be in attendance. And I spoke to one man and I asked him this very question. And he's like,

Blanchard (17:00.64)
One of the things that I do to add value is I make sure, and I have a deep fear that we, if we fail to do this, but I make sure that the decisions that we make in Sacramento at the political level, down through the ranks, that they don't put the firefighter in danger or in peril in the summer when they're fighting a large brush fire and they're really fighting for their lives and for lives of the people whose communities and properties they're protecting.

I want to make sure that the decisions we're making, they cascade down and they prepare that person and they don't put them in a disadvantage. And, and I kind of came around and I said, well, that's, that's lovely. mean, that we say in America, that's sort of like baseball mom and apple pie, right? That sounds, that sounds beautiful, but, what are you doing? What are you doing when you're doing that? And he's like, well, I get in my truck.

and I drive out by myself to fire stations. And I said, what do you do? And he goes, well, I talk to firefighters. And I said, so what do you talk about? What do you talk about with the firefighters? He said, nobody's asked me that. I said, and he said, I asked them to teach me something that I don't know.

teach me something about their job or about their life within the fire service that I probably don't know that would be useful for me to know. And he said, and I find out things that are invaluable about what's happening with these guys' steel-toed boots that are sitting there preparing to fight these big fires. And he goes, those moments are really invaluable. And I've used those examples all the way up and through the chain. And it connects me to what we're doing is preparing these people to.

defend property and communities and do it in a way where they make it home to their families. so it's a perfect example of how do you add value and the best leaders every single time I talk to them is there's always something about the way that they approach their mindset that is in the spirit of understanding and connecting.

Blanchard (19:16.628)
people from the frontline all the way up to the vision and missions to make sure that our actions and our thoughts are the things that we want versus the things that we don't. And one final thing, what do you think?

the impact is on that firefighter that spoke to the chief, you and his buddies are like, the big chief came in the white shirt. Were you in trouble? Like, what was he talking about? He's like, no, he asked me to teach him something. Right? And it just communicates a message that there's a keen interest to take the time to come out and speak to the frontline to find out what's going on. So we see those examples again and again, and in every organization, there are existing pockets of leadership right now.

that is exemplary, is great. And what a lot of times is we don't study those anomalies and what we do is we look at the problems related to leadership or we look at the big mass that we need to move forward. But if you look at the best leaders already in your organization, they are doing the things that are creating great results, great followership. And the third thing is those leaders through relationship and example, they create the great leaders of the future.

great leaders literally create a chain of great leaders in their way.

Simon Brown (20:39.426)
I'm fascinated by the commonality that you see through those, because if you're getting to talk to those three top leaders in every organization that you work with, so you described, I guess, a curiosity of going down into the weeds of what's there, and you tell me a story, tell me something I can learn. mean, that cries out to me of curiosity. And you described this also ability to connect from the top of the organization down to the bottom. But are there other traits?

traits that you see as commonalities across those leaders when you're talking to them. Great results, great followership, creating other great leaders, those feel like results coming out from it. But what are the traits you see in those leaders themselves as a commonality?

Blanchard (21:29.184)
I mean, we did a study one time with one of the largest ERP software in the world. They're just a big conglomerate that we did business with for many years. And they were experiencing higher levels than they wanted to of failure when people got to a certain level where their leadership, and they sort of like either left or it didn't work out. And it's devastating when you promote somebody to a senior level and they don't work out because it takes usually two years and it could be millions of dollars, right?

So we actually got in and we did some example interviewing and one of the things that we found were there was these four common traits. And one of them was when we interviewed the best, they have a knack for communicating the vision and the purpose of the meaning of the work that we're doing to everybody at all times in a way that is consistent and resonates with people. And they tend to have this propensity that they're always talking about where we're going.

not where am I taking you, but where are we going? Number one. Number two is they take great interest in the people that they have working for them because they sort of innately understand that they can't do the job themselves. And the only way that they're going to accomplish this grand set of goals that they have for themselves is to align the people that are working with them and for them to actually be in support of where they're going. So they take a tremendous interest.

in not only developing people, but they have a propensity to hire, and they talk about hiring people that are smarter than them in their discipline, right, in their area of expertise, that they have an affinity towards hiring people and working with people and engaging those leaders. On the other side, what we found with the leaders that fail is that they tend to,

a lot of times either move away from or even eliminate people that can be a threat to them or people that actually may have, you know, maybe smarter than them, you know, like, frankly. The third one that was really interesting, especially in large organizations is the best leaders are bridge builders across complex organizations or across any organizations. They actually create cooperation through alignment around the vision, but they work to create

Blanchard (23:54.112)
allies to the organization and what they also do is they make sure that they're not creating enemies, right? They work and they have this political sort of affluence that a lot of times is unconscious, but it's important because it's, you know, you really have to make sure that people are not only coming with you, but you need to make sure that you don't have, you know, things that are opposed. And then the last piece is a result of a lot of that things they tend to produce.

really winning results, right? So the results come from them. So they're very, very, very results oriented, but most of the results from the best, they come from speaking of the big picture, but on a relentless focus, are what are we doing in the moment today to not waste a day, to not waste a moment, to not waste a week, to not waste a month?

And it's interesting, the best of the best, they have a very big plan in terms of where they're going, but their focus is on planning the day, winning the day, planning the week, winning the week, planning the month, winning the month. And so it's a remarkable thing to see. And then the leaders that tend to fail, there's a tenant called goal pressure. And what they tend to do is they tend to use goal pressure, like pointing to the result.

And what they do is they don't really have the propensity to get into the middle of those small activities, those the cascading set of activities that create the winning pattern. And so it's so interesting in athletics and in business is like the great leaders there, they create a vision. They're very concerned about the people around them and building the right team. And they get everybody focused on more.

near term intermediate goals in service to the big picture versus what we see on the other side. And it's a remarkable fingerprint on both sides.

Garrick (25:57.786)
Scott, you talked about the question of leadership having your back. Does your leader have your back? said. Why is that so essential and what does it look like in practice?

Blanchard (26:03.433)
Yeah.

Blanchard (26:12.836)
I learned when I was in college on my first internship from a wonderful man, Francisco Wheelock. He said, I was a supervisor in a very large hotel in a dishwashing department. had like 75 dishwashers and he took me to lunch and he said, I need to be careful this summer while you're here because the way that you treat people today becomes dinner conversation in their homes this evening.

Right. And I don't want people talking about you this evening around the dinner table. It began my curiosity. And so one of the things that we've that we found around trust and trust is such a commonly talked about things is the is the best leaders. They they take they create the condition where they have people's back, meaning that through thick or thin, through failure or through success, that the leader is there to support them as a human being, as an employee.

Right? And what it takes is a leap of logic in the beginning because many people are like, I would trust you when I can trust you. Right? When you give me enough evidence of performance, then I'm willing to trust you. Right? And what having your back requires is that I'm going to trust you to a certain degree before you've earned my trust. Right? I'm actually going to put my faith in you.

and then we're going to work together. And when people have that sense of my leader has my back, then it frees them up to actually be able to take the risks that come with leaning into good performance. And they're not so much worried about, you know, the past and it enables employees specifically, this is a neuroscience concept. It maintains employees to maintain their composure, right? So to maintain our composure, we need to focus on the things in the moment.

that are gonna help us work through this moment, whether it's stressful or not or dangerous or not, in the best way possible. But if my leader doesn't have my back, then I have anxiety about what's happened in the past or those consequences that could come from them in the future. And by definition, I'm not focused on the present because I'm worried about the consequences from this leader. And the reason that it matters, Garrick, is the leader has the ability

Blanchard (28:31.432)
in people's mind to reward me, right, to provide opportunity or to punish me or ultimately to sanction me or fire me, right? That is the role that I have. I'm one step up in the hierarchy. My leader has position-based authority over me. And so if they choose to, they can actually, you know, they can use that. And so it's one of the reasons why

when people get promoted out of the ranks, right? What happens? Their peers stop talking to them the same way they do. They stop getting invited out for a beer. They get unfriended on Facebook. They are not part of the crew anymore, right? They're now the leader. They're in a different realm within the company. There's literally a different culture. And so if that person that's responsible for you, that is not us, because this is the person I work for,

If they're not safe, it changes everything. It's always the leader.

Simon Brown (29:35.968)
I remember one of my bosses in the past explicitly saying that, I mean, I have your back on you. And it does, creates such a confidence and a safety knowing that you've got that. A few words that makes a huge difference. So we're talking with Scott Blanchard. Scott is son of the great Ken Blanchard and he's the CEO and co-owner of Blanchard. He's got more than 30 years of experience there, including a number of senior positions in management, product development, sales and delivery. And he's driven by his background in research.

hands-on experience working with organisations around the world that prove its principle that the success or failure of any business depends squarely on the quality of its leaders and every employee and customer's experience whether that's good or bad is determined by the leader. So with this in mind Scott's dedicated to helping managers and leaders finding the best way to avoid the pain, the fear, the frustration and the political mayhem that occurs in the absence of good leadership. So just talking about

trust there, Scott, coincidentally, one of our recent podcasts was with Charlie Green, who wrote the Trusted Advisor book, so we went deep into trust there. But what would you say to leaders who are afraid to trust before trust is fully earned? So you talked about that being important to actually give that trust before it's fully earned, but how can people start that journey to take that risk?

Blanchard (31:02.816)
It is a...

It is a fundamental, you know.

cornerstone of effective leadership and it's also a big leap of logic for people. What's interesting, however, is one of the things I've related it to, you know, in the past is it's sort of like unconditional love that we have for, you know, for children, right? And so one of the ideas is, you know, I ask people if they love their children and they're like, of course I love my children. And then the next question is, do you love your

your children unconditionally or is your love dependent on their on their performance, right? On how well they do or how well they behave. And almost everybody certainly raised their hand. They're like, you know, I know I have this unconditional love of my kids and that's what makes it so hard. Despite what they do, I just have this deep, you know, love for my kids, right? And there's which creates an ability to, you know, to forgive and to forget and to have their back. Right. And it's very, very similar.

in leading people. And Marcus Buckingham just presented at our client conference and he's written a new book about love and he's been studying love and he's a very interesting man. His firm was sold to ADP, which is the largest payroll company in the company. And he gets to study 400 million Americans that are employed. And so it's like a candy shop for him. And one of the things that he talked about is that he's been studying, similar to us,

Blanchard (32:39.45)
know, exemplar performance, right? Looking at like one of the stories he talked about was a large coffee retailer that had, you know, like 10,000 stores, a very large one. And what he did is he looked at the organizations that had the highest satisfaction and the highest performance, the one or two that were way at the top, right? Not the big masses. And what he found consistently, we found the same thing, is the people in those operations, they love their boss.

They love their work. They love their coworkers and they love their customers and they use the word love. Love is a description, right? And when people describe the best periods of their life in work, they use the word love freely, right? And to me it's there because it's true is being a leader is similar to and requires that we have

as long as people are working with us and for us and unconditional or forgiving love for the people that work for us because they are in our service, they're in our care. And, but what's interesting that Marcus has also said, which I agree with is, is this is the counter to that is that we live in a society, certainly in the States and I know in Europe, probably more so here where the expectations and the tools that we provide managers

are more about protecting the organization, sometimes from its employees. And so we have barriers in place as managers that make it hard.

to actually do the right thing. And so the best leaders are able to comply, but they transcend and they lead people at a human level. Because after all, you can't really separate your being human when you go to work. I I bring everything to work. There's certain things that I park during the day, but ultimately, my human experience.

Blanchard (34:43.836)
is heavily informed by my appointment experience. And my employment experience is heavily informed by the experience that I have with my leader and with my coworker with the customers or the people that I serve. So it's funny, I really believe that it's literally right under our nose. And I've always believed that if leaders understood, number one, the power that they have to ruin people's lives or to make their lives wonderful. If leaders just understood that they have this power,

to ruin the dinner conversation that they would take what they did more seriously. And the second thing, if they realize that if they can act as human beings and they need to bring this unconditional positive regard to their people first, that then and only then can they get the most out of them. And then the third thing is being a leader is very human and the things that we crave are the things that...

people below us crave and what happens to leaders and I call this the original sin, is they get to a point where they start to do things with people that they themselves would not tolerate.

And that's where the problems begin, right? If you start doing something because you're that you yourself would not tolerate and you didn't really put up very well with when you were a subordinate, then you're making that original, you know, that original error.

Paul (36:16.217)
I fully agree with you that I imagine most leaders come into work

Hopefully you said earlier with the intention of leading well, leading with humanity, bringing the best of themselves. But when they're having a bad day or when their organization is having a difficult time, at the moment we have quite a lot of unrest geopolitically. There's a huge amount of change, fast moving technologies, very much changing the game. How do you bring your best self into lead?

How do you lead with that steadiness and humanity, even in those types of situations? What's your advice for leaders there?

Blanchard (37:03.04)
Well, I'll tell you, it is hard, right? So I've been saying to people close to me recently that I'm using every tactic I have to show up at work in such a way that I'm not bringing the fear, anxiety, and concern that I have for the larger market in which we work to work in such a way that it's a black cloud. So I'm doing everything that I can.

And one of the things that I've done, I've gone back during the Great Recession, I delved into what's the difference between leading in crisis versus leading in any kind of a more ordinary time. And of course, we're in this Vukor world, there's nothing ordinary, but there's times that are less ordinary than most, right? And we're in one of those very, you know, kind of less oriented times. And what people need to survive and thrive in crisis is they need two things. And they need from their leaders. And the first thing is they need something to

to believe for, believe in, something to live for, something bigger than themselves, something that they're striving for. When people get into life-threatening situations, they need a fundamental reason to endure and to survive. And when they've studied people that have actually made it, there's been a specific signal of why I went through this great sacrifice to survive, to see a loved one or to whatever. But the second thing is we need something to do

right now, because as human beings, if our hands are idle, especially in critical times, what it does is it leads, it creates opportunities for anxiety to build. And so one of the things is what can we do today, right now, that will enable us to take, to inch forward, right? You know, to inch forward. And so it's a very, very tricky time right now. And so, and I believe the other piece is you.

We can't be, we can't ignore what's happening and what people are feeling like. so providing people an opportunity to, to at least be able to air some of that is important, but also, you know, we can't also dwell on things that we can't, that we can't control, right? So providing enough opportunity for people to sort of put the things on the table, but then so get back to a place so we can do what we can, we can do. You know, I always think about the, you know, the, the, the ultimate thing is, is, you know, I,

Blanchard (39:31.166)
I need to focus on what I can control and not the things that I can't control and please, know, grab me the wisdom to know the difference. And I think that that's what leadership is really about. it's, I'm not going to say it's easy. It's fiendishly difficult right now, especially when people are coming in. But there's a thing about work that I believe is I actually believe that work can be and should be

Garrick (39:46.008)
Yeah

Blanchard (39:59.09)
a sanctuary that is better and safer than the larger world.

And I think that that's, we spend half of our waking hours at work and that's why it's so important to create that environment where at least at work we can focus on those things that we can affect to move forward.

Garrick (40:18.098)
The things we can't affect, where we can make a difference, that can empower us and give us agency. That's where I find meaning in my own life and I hear you reinforcing that. I'm very curious about you, Scott. What are you personally most curious about right now?

Blanchard (40:40.69)
very curious about AI. I'm having a love affair with with ChatGPT and one of the things I'm doing is I'm speaking to my instance, you know, like I do with a human being and especially when I'm writing or I'm trying to edit things, I'm

being very careful about the adjudges I'm used to describing what I don't like and what I would like to see. And it's so interesting. And so I'm really fascinated by how that is going to play out. Right. And I know there's a lot of we have a pretty large coaching practice and one of the things that people are fearful over talking about or excited about is the notion that we're going to have some kind of an AI coaching bot. We're to have somebody that's going to be able to

you know, to be that person on our right shoulder that's actually providing us with guidance. I'm really curious to see if that's going to play out. I personally feel like the one thing that AI can't do yet or I haven't felt yet is I don't think it can actually love you, you know, as a human being. And I think that that's, if that can be figured out, you know, it'll be interesting, you know, to see. So I'm very curious about how that's going to play out, how it's going to affect

you know, the way we actually write, you know, the way that we relate with each other and what's gonna happen in pockets where AI is really present and in areas of the world where it's not present or it's like there's a dome and it's not allowed to be, right? I think that'll be an interesting thing. So that's a very curious thing right now. And the last piece I'll say is,

Blanchard (42:31.006)
I'm always curious about how are people going to lead through this? Because it's always the context that we sit in is just always the context in which leaders need to lead in. And so that's the other thing is no matter what changes, somebody is going be in charge of an entity or an organization and they're going to have to try to figure out how do we set course? How do we get through this regardless? And I don't believe that AI is going to

to replace that, it's just going to provide a different environment, maybe one that I fundamentally don't recognize.

Simon Brown (43:07.15)
We absolutely share that curiosity on where AI is going and yeah, thing that actually curiosity is also part of the answer there as well that actually, how do you set the course? Where do you go? Actually asking questions, experimenting, those are some of the traits that will actually help us navigate. So in a moment, Scott, I'll sort of wrap us up with one thing maybe to leave with our listeners, but maybe first by way of just a quick summary of some of the things that we've covered.

in the fascinating conversation. guess hearing how initially it was some of your fear of tech of how it would change the seminar business that actually got you into some of the exciting things that came subsequently.

how you took on the role of president and how since then you've been helping people to become better leaders including using tech along the way and helping them to use tech. Going into what it means to lead and the impact that leaders can have on an organization and how if we look at all the successes or the failures along the way that we can tie that back off into the leader behind the scene and the role that they've played. Talked about protection and how sometimes maybe as we try to protect ourselves

actually the things that we do to protect ourselves actually make things worse that maybe we're less able to change. We about intentions and how it's the attitude that actually will stand up to pressure or not, what we believe in. We talked about the importance of the relationship with the direct manager of is that manager helping us to feel valued and useful, helping us to do things that matter and helping us to perform under pressure.

It's great to hear your stories from good leaders and some of the things that people have asked along the way of that power question of how do you add value personally to the organisation and I love the example from the fire service of you me something that I didn't know before and that curiosity. Talked about the four common traits that you've seen in leaders so the ability to communicate that vision purpose and meaning of where are

Simon Brown (45:21.442)
going. How those great leaders have taken an interest in their people, true interest in developing people and hiring people smarter than themselves as well and how that's a failure on the other side of poor leaders who maybe eliminate people they see as a threat to maybe better. Third piece around bridge builders, creating allies and not enemies across the organisation and then how they produce winning results.

those results are also they're rooted in today. mean, what am going to do today, this week, this month, et cetera. Went into trust and how we need to have that sort of unconditional trust in the way we do for our children that can we bring some of that in of actually trusting people before they've actually earned that trust and how that creates power within the team. And then the power of that dinner conversation of, what's someone in your team going to go home today and say,

to their spouse, that leaders have the power to ruin or to make things wonderful. And I think that's an incredibly powerful piece to maybe close my summer on. So Scott, what would be the one thing for our listeners to take away from this rich conversation?

Blanchard (46:40.608)
It's very interesting listening to the recap. I appreciate that. I think that the thing that I believe in, and it's a counter to the other belief, is that

Leadership is good leadership, right? Is in service to something noble and good and it's centered around things like connection, and love, right? That's a model that is and has been very effective. And then there's another model, which is bad leadership, fear-based leadership. And there's a...

So I just sort of, I'm remembering that we have been in business for all these years and the work of my father has always had, you know, a positive focus on the positive side, the positive story, you know, the positive means of leadership, that transformative power as a counter to the other tactics that are more pressure-based, fear-based, power-based. We see both examples all the time and one of the things that we believe is that the

You know the positive endures, you know, and I think that I'd say the last thing is that I believe and we believe and I think the research supports that when you become a leader, it's a sacred responsibility. And I think a lot of people don't really think about it that way because they haven't been taught. And most leaders who aren't working really well, they have positive intentions, but they haven't really kind of made the leap of that and understand that it's a sacred responsibility in their service to people.

As you become a leader, you are a professional manager. It's incumbent on you to learn how to use the people and the power that you've been entrusted with for the positive, in my opinion, and in our opinion, and really in support of what we've been doing here for 40, for 45 years. And so that's it. I feel like I heard just the good, the good assumptions beneath all that.

Simon Brown (48:51.916)
But so recognizing that, yeah, we have the power to make that a positive dinner conversation or a terrible dinner conversation when people go home. Yeah, it's a sacred responsibility that we have as leaders. So thank you, Scott. Really appreciate a fascinating conversation.

Blanchard (48:59.87)
Yeah.

Garrick (49:08.89)
Thank you Scott, that was amazing.

Paul (49:09.73)
Thank you.

Blanchard (49:10.922)
Thank you. Thank you.

Simon Brown (49:12.794)
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curiously. See you next time!

Blanchard (49:46.784)
Cheers.