Catherine McDonald  00:04

The basic premise of lean, where he starts foundationally, is with respect for the people we work with.

Sam Yankelevitch  00:12

To show respect, you have to do the clarity up front. When you do things up front and you have clarity up front, chances are things are gonna come out much better than when you rush through a conversation. This, for me, is a huge opportunity for leaders to show respect for people by developing them, and so it opens up this opportunity for you to read as a leader into a gap of what the skill sets are that might be missing from the person. Respectful delegation

Shayne Daughenbaugh  00:41

actually is equal to an invitation to be engaged and involved. Hello and welcome to the Lean solutions podcast. My name is Shane dauphinbaugh, my lovely co host, Catherine MacDonald, we are here on this journey with you. Catherine, how are you today?

Catherine McDonald  01:08

Yeah, I’m well, Shane, I’m very well. Yeah, it’s been a good day. It’s gone fast. It’s always a good sign. How are you I am well

Shayne Daughenbaugh  01:15

as well. And again, for me, it’s been a great day. It’s still early for me, here in the States, I know from Ireland, it’s probably what, 656, something like that. Okay, yep, six, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So good day for for me today. This morning, I went to my local Chamber of Commerce and got to hang out with some really cool people that helped grow my city. And that was really cool to see the leadership and the growth of the city has been fun as well. We’ve been here for 20 years now, and just watching how the city grows, the things they’re doing. You know that that’s been that’s been really cool, but it got me thinking, and I have a question for you, when was the time? Because you haven’t always been a consultant. You haven’t always owned your own company. You have worked with other agencies. And I know we’ve talked about this before, some local government agencies, or, you know, country agencies, whatever government agencies, what, what I was, what I was going for. When was a time when you really grew in your role, not just learned a new skill, but actually grew, yeah,

Catherine McDonald  02:23

good question, good question. So absolutely, I wasn’t always just working for myself. I started out working in social care and specifically the disability sector, and I was in that sector for 13 years, and I had a boss during that time. For those whole 13 years, I had many bosses over the years, but I guess in answer to your question, there were different times where I felt I really did take a step up in my role, where, where I really felt myself growing. And I guess when I think back and really try to understand what those times were, it was always where I took on something that stretched me that made me feel like questioning myself a little bit, you know, to go, am I able for this? Is this something that I, you know, that I can do? Um, do I believe in myself? Enough so my bosses that I had were, I was very lucky in the bosses that I had, because they they believed in me, I guess maybe more than I believed in myself. I at the time. I think that’s true, you know, so always at those times of growth, it was always where they showed me that. But it wasn’t just talk. It wasn’t just, oh, Catherine, you know, you’re great. We believe in you. It was what they did, was they actually gave me work that was a big responsibility was something that I had to deliver on, where there was clear deadlines, where it was important to the organization. So will I give you an example, just very quickly? Yeah, yeah. Okay, so back when I started in the disability sector, we there was a new kind of regulatory body that came in called Hi QA, and anybody from Ireland who’s listening to this will will probably have heard, but maybe other people won’t. So basically it was the health information and quality authority. And up to that point, Shane, the disability sector in Ireland, wasn’t really regulated. There was no standards. So every organization basically had their own standards. So at this point in time, the standards had just come in, and I was basically just out of college and just hearing about this kick well, and understanding that, oh, wow, I’ve just moved myself into a sector where suddenly we’re being regulated and nobody has any clue what to do. But I think it seemed a bit daunting at the time. It’s everybody was in a little bit of a panic over it. But as I mentioned, the bosses that I had were really great. They were We were basically sitting around a management meeting table, and the senior leaders who were present at the table just went, we haven’t a clue. We haven’t a clue what this hiccup thing is. We haven’t a clue what these standards will mean for the organization, but we trust that you guys will be able to handle it. So barely, barely, I guess a supervisor at the time, barely a team leader. They handed us the book of standards. This was a little booklet at the time, and in it, there was all these kind of broad, sweeping statements, like, ensure that your residents have privacy and dignity, ensure that they have choice in their day, and all these just sweeping statements that we hadn’t a clue what to do it. So basically it put the responsibility back on us to go back to our teams and to have the discussions about what these standards meant, and to challenge ourselves by asking ourselves these questions, do we meet these standards? How do we meet these standards? And I’d never really done anything like that before. It had always been day to day management. What are we doing this week? What are we doing next week? So it really brought me into the world of strategy, of proper team planning for improvement. So for me, it was a massive, massive big deal being able to take on that responsibility and feeling like I was supported to do that. So it’s

Shayne Daughenbaugh  06:01

great. That’s that’s a huge deal that you were given that opportunity, right, given that responsibility. You know, I, I talk a lot with with my clients and their leadership. You know about delegation as a way to free up a leader’s time. You know, because all the leaders that I’ve worked with, and probably you as well. You know, have have so much going on in their plate, you know, how can we get things off their plate so they can do other things, like there’s they’ve surrounded themselves by great people, but, you know, are they? Are they able to get some of this off their plate? And as I think about it now, especially with what you’re talking about here, you know, delegation is a way of freeing up a leader’s time. But what if we flip that? What if delegation wasn’t just about freeing up time, wasn’t just about, you know, efficiency and lean What if it’s about respect, right? Like your leaders respected you enough and knew enough about you and saw something in you that you may not even have seen yourself, but giving you those responsibilities is a way of saying, Catherine, we respect you and what you have to offer as part of this team. Like I think that’s pretty awesome.

Catherine McDonald  07:09

I think so Shane, I think it has to be one of the highest forms of belief in somebody, right, giving them those responsibilities. So anyway, that is what we are digging in today with our guests, and maybe Shane, would you like to do the honors and introduce our guests? I would love to

Shayne Daughenbaugh  07:30

Yeah. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. Let me introduce to you. Sam. Yankel. Yankel Levitch, I have to say this multiple times, did I yank helllevich, did I do? Did I do it? Did I do it? Okay, it’s

Sam Yankelevitch  07:47

it’s all Plan, Do Check Act. It’s all Plan Do Check Act, you did well, yes.

Shayne Daughenbaugh  07:52

Sam is the CEO of Express lingo solutions, a TEDx speaker and a corporate trainer focused on aligning people, process and communication to close performance gaps. As an industrial engineer and former VP of global operations, he also brings a deep expertise in Lean quality and problem solving methodologies. Sam is popular in LinkedIn learning as a LinkedIn learning instructor with over 75 or 750,000 learners. That’s huge. Sam and the author of several books, including lean potion number nine, loving these titles, walking the invisible gamba and the fictional title and interview with failure. He lives in South Carolina with his wife and borrowed dog. I’m just, I just have questions here and believes in lifelong learning and giving back. Sam, welcome to the show. We’re happy to have you here.

Sam Yankelevitch  08:48

Thank you for the invitation. I’m very happy to be here and share with your audience. I

Shayne Daughenbaugh  08:53

am as well. So So real quick, borrowed dog, like there’s so

08:57

much. Oh yeah, but

Sam Yankelevitch  08:58

I put that in there so I have, so we, I’ve got four kids, one of our, our youngest daughter went to college. She had a dog, and it was just too complicated, so we kind of adopted it. And, you know, she’s coming back for him very soon. So he’s borrowed, so he’s borrowed for now. He’s just, he’s just, he’s tremendous, you know, he’s been, right? He’s been my mentor. You always need a mentor, right? Yeah, that’s some,

Catherine McDonald  09:24

somebody who doesn’t talk back to you ideally, you know, right? Perfect.

Sam Yankelevitch  09:27

Exactly.

Shayne Daughenbaugh  09:30

How did, how did you get involved with LinkedIn learning that you have that many learners that you’ve been able to influence? Yeah, so

Sam Yankelevitch  09:37

I’ve been, it’s just very fortunate, and you know, to reach that amount of learners globally is a privilege, because you can’t do that like just the way that, like just doing consulting and training the way that we usually do with, you know, at corporate clients or even at conferences, right? You know, you can do 1000s, but to get the hundreds of 1000s and to reach people in India. Yeah, and, you know, the Arab countries, it’s just, it’s been amazing. So it’s just, you know, apply, applied at the right time, send a demo, real and got accepted, and then they were just, you know, threatening me with purchase orders, you know, to Hey, could you do, could you do one of these? Could you do one of the that, you know, but it, it’s, it’s great work, because you have to focus on the learner. And when you focus, you focus on the learner. You’re really forced to teach a certain way, to be very, very clear. And that has, you know, that has helped tremendously. But, you know, one thing that’s left out of my, of my bio there, you know me, my so you can tell I got some gray hair back here,

Shayne Daughenbaugh  10:49

but just a couple, never a couple, but, you know,

Sam Yankelevitch  10:52

but, but the I’m, you know, My motto is, I’m too old to grow up. I’m too young to stop learning and delighted to give back. And so LinkedIn learning has been an opportunity to do that globally. And yeah, so it’s been, it’s just been great, you know, to be able to do that and share what

Shayne Daughenbaugh  11:14

are, what are like your top, you know, some of your top courses that you’ve taught, yeah. So

Sam Yankelevitch  11:19

the top courses are problem solving and root cause analysis and and then the other ones are all about communication, including one on lean, how to use Lean principles to improve communication in corporations. And one of them is about delegation, which I’m hopeful that we’re going to be able to talk about today. Let’s do and then and corporate culture. So it’s, you know, and it’s all from this Lean upbringing over the 40 years. You know, I mean before, before the word lean was coined, I was always somehow involved in in continuous improvement activities. So, so it’s been, it’s just been a privilege to have access to to this knowledge and then be able to share it back with with with people in the world that that can you make it useful in their in their life and in corporate that’s

Catherine McDonald  12:09

amazing. Sam, well done. Congratulations. Really, really great. And on the books as well, which we didn’t talk too much about, but as as everybody heard, you have books there as well, which people can take a look at. So you touched on it there. That the topic for today, that we’re really going to dive into now is respect driven delegation. So Right? We’re everybody listening to this probably has some idea of what Lean is all about, but lean, the basic premise of lean, where Lean starts, the foundation of Lean is with respect for the people we work with, right, right? So talk to us a little bit about that. When it comes to your experiences of of facilitating lean in an organization summer or an organization to be lean. What? What do you think is the best way, or some ways to, let’s say, balance accountability, which you know, there has to be this clarity of what needs to be done, expectations that need to be, you know, said to people, there has to be deadlines and all of this. How do you get work done? Make sure everybody’s getting work done and following up on what they said they’ll do, and balance that with or do that with respect for people, when you’re delegating responsibility. So tell us a little bit about about that.

Sam Yankelevitch  13:28

Yeah, so you know that word accountability, by the way, is usually it’s taken as a negative, which is kind of, you know, which is just a bad, you know, a bad idea, because accountability is not negative. It’s, you know, and there’s this famous quote that account, you know, what is it? Accountability is, what ties commitments to results. So what you just mentioned Catherine is, is, is very key, because at the end of the day, I mean, we’re there to get results right, and hopefully in a controlled way, because you’re always going to get results, right. So the number one thing I talk about first is that accountability should not be negative. And sometimes you begin with positive accountability. What happens when somebody actually does make a commitment and then they follow through and there’s success. Sometimes, you know, sometimes we don’t even recognize that. And culturally, you know, there’s a lot of managers that are going to say, well, that’s their job anyways. But in some cultures, it’s very important to do the recognition when something is actually gets done. That drives, you know, that drives the true accountability, which is, you know, something got done, but the accountability, and how that ties to respect and delegation, is, for me, is, how do you do that? By driving clarity upfront between the person the task. Giver and the task receiver. When there’s no clarity, then it’s an unfair equation there, because you might be setting up the other person for failure, and at the end of the day, you’re going to set up yourself as a leader for failure as well, right? So to show respect you, you have to do the clarity upfront. And that not only, and I’ll explain through a framework that I use, which is a very simple framework, how do you how do you do that? But at the same time, it’s not only respect for people, but it’s also respect for time. Because remember when you do things up front and you have clarity up front, chances are things are going to come out much better than when you rush through a conversation. Expectations are not clear and through through the Intimidator function, you You force the other person to say yes, and that yes might mean so many things. You know, yes, I just want you to move, move away from me. I want to get you out of my hair. I’m intimidated by you. I’m not really sure, yes, but I’m not really sure I’m going to do it, versus a respectful way to do it, where you clarify upfront, also how you’re going to measure performance that you know, that specific way that you can measure performance, which ties back to what we do in Lean, right? And otherwise, if you don’t do that, as you will, you’ve probably experienced Yes, I did, no, I didn’t. Yes, I did, no, you didn’t. You know when you’re talking about whether you fulfill the commitment and performance was was done. It’s like, you know, how do you measure and and so I’ll, you know, I’ll get to the to the framework. And just, is just one second. But this is this for me, is a huge opportunity for leaders to show respect by for people, by developing them. And so it opens up this opportunity for you to read, as a leader, into a gap of what the skill sets are that might be missing from the person. And the framework is very simple. I learned this from a coach. I was a very bad manager at one point, a very bad leader. No, oh yeah. Well, you know, this is, this is what you get. It’s experience right there, you know? But I was brought in to, this is kind of funny. I’m Colombian originally, so I have, you know, I have a Colombian built in culture. I’ve been in the States for many years, and I’ve traveled the world. I speak many languages, so I have a pretty rich cultural background. I was brought in and hired to drive Lean transformation in a German based company in the US. Wow. And so here I am a Colombian. I’m supposed to be the guy that’s going to teach the German engineers who you know most, you know. I’m not going to generalize, but, but they’re mostly known for knowing everything and everything is their way or the highway, and this was the case in this company. So it was very difficult at the beginning, and at one point I had, I had to have an executive coach, and he’s the guy that taught me this with this, with the following story, he had his, one of his kids asked if they could throw a party at the house, and he agreed, as long as they would clean the house after the party. Sure the coach comes back to his house and there’s crumbs on the floor, and there’s one, just one beer can lift somewhere, you know, in, you know. And he says, we agreed you were going to clean. And the boy says, but I did clean. No, you didn’t. Yes, I did. No, you didn’t. Yes, I did. So what was the expectation when you say the word clean? What does that mean? What did it mean to that person, and what did it mean to the person giving the task? Right? And so he taught me this framework that I call, I now call it commitment conversations. And the commitment conversation is the process by which you can get to respectful accountability. It’s made up of five steps, actually six, but I’ll talk about the five. It’s who is going to do what, by when, which pretty much is that where we stop, and that’s where you’re asking the other person for a yes. And unfortunately, depending on the culture, you’re going to get an easy yes. That sets up an easy yes question. You get an easy yes answer. And yes can mean many things. In fact, I have a list of 10 years as somewhere when I teach this. So there’s two more elements, the what if and the what’s next. The What if element is acknowledging that uncertainty exists. That means that I am acknowledging as a task. Giver that many things can happen between now that we agree on whatever the task is and when it’s supposed to get done. So my ask is that when you see anything that might hinder the agreement that we just set for getting this task done, you let me know immediately, so that we can both come back and figure out what to do and how to mitigate, right, the situation, right? So that’s, that’s the that’s the the fourth, the fifth one is what’s next, and that is the follow up. So that is requiring and requesting that we follow up every Monday afternoon at 4pm EST, to make sure that things are on track. Now you have a now you have a common understanding. And by the way, in the in the who’s going to do, what by when, in that what you’re setting the measure clearly, how, how are we going to measure success in your performance. That way, it’s very clear now. So, so now you have these five elements in there, which is a very strong contract. I call that the standard. And when you’re holding somebody accountable, you can go back to that contract. It’s almost like a written contract which encompasses all of these things with absolute and total clarity. But the cool thing is then that you when you ask, even after you have all this conversation, you’re not pushing for an easy yes answer, because it might still be intimidating. That’s where the respect comes from. And you open up with a different question and say, what might prevent you from from doing this? What suggestions do you have to help us get through and actually produce the results that we’re looking for? That’s those are, you know, typical questions later on, I’ll share with you the magic question that really gets everybody involved, but tan, tan, tan will hold off to do that. But that’s there’s a magic question that actually opens up that space to help develop people and show respect in a very specific in a very specific way. So I’m, I’ve been talking a lot, so I don’t know if any questions or anything. No,

Shayne Daughenbaugh  22:19

I’m loving this so, and I don’t know, Catherine, what you were able to pick up, but you know who’s doing what by when. So those are the two questions there. You know, what if understanding there’s uncertainty in here, and how will we overcome these obstacles, right? What’s next, follow up? And then what you just said, I also love that, and I don’t know where you put that into the conversation, if that’s just part of it, but the you know, what might prevent you from doing this. So, so now we have a dialog. I’m not just telling you how to do things, but I’m trying to get also from you. Okay, so we’re, we’re collaborating on, on this, whatever this task is, right? You know. So what do you think is going to be something that, you know, we may need, that may be in the way that we need to be aware of? So I am really appreciating how that conversation kind of flows and, you know, moves around

Sam Yankelevitch  23:11

Right, right? And so that’s, you know, so that’s that framework. And, you know, I think when I’ve been out there doing this, people love frameworks, because it’s something to go back to, because we have very bad habits. You know, that that mentioned that I that I said, you know, when, when, when you’re talking about clean, you know, I got the four kids, I’ve made that same mistake. And so we carry these bad habits from the house to work, and then we think that everybody understands 100% what our expectation is. And that just you know, that just it’s not good. I’m going to introduce a one, one word that I wanted to share with with your audience, once you have, once you have that, that standard that you have an agreement on, if the you know, if the if the agreement is not 100% clear for both and each of each person walks away with a different expectation. What you then have is a misunderstanding standard, right? You have a misunderstanding, right? Yes. And so I like to, you know, I like to joke around with with words. But this is, for the lean, for the Lean community, a huge opportunity to understand that, you know, because I’m a big believer in communication and how communication actually drives actions, but we often forget that communication is not one way. Communication comes from the original Latin, the same basis, the same origin, as common as in common understanding, right? And and so I say that clarity is the effect of communication should be the effect of adequate communication. And dialog is really where you know where you want to get to to that and that common understanding is. Is what I call the standard, so that when you hold somebody accountable, you know, okay, now you have that five piece agreement, right now you hold now they now, the the, the, let’s say the the job didn’t get done properly, you’re going to hold that person accountable anyways, in a respectful way. Right? How do you do that? You go back to the standard. You don’t have to get emotional and said, Look, you and I agreed that this, this and that that didn’t happen. They’ll start out with a bunch of excuses. Yeah, well, you know, HR didn’t get me the people on time. You know, sales made some commitments that we weren’t able to to fulfill. You know, the engineering department did this. They go out there in the blue yonder to a bunch of excuses, you’re bringing them back to the standard and you say, Yeah, I understand that, but you and I committed, you know, you committed to this, plus, right, didn’t let me know. You didn’t let me know. And that is the biggest problem, you know, because you and I agreed that you would let me know immediately, and you didn’t, and, you know, that kind of stuff. So so that standard works as a contract to do the accountability in a very I call that respectful, because at the end of the day, you know, you went through the whole motion, you spent up time upfront to prevent issues further down the line. And you know, if that person did not commit, well, you’re going to give them a second chance later on, and, you know, to build trust and stuff like that. But yeah, that’s how it works.

Catherine McDonald  26:26

Can I ask the question then, Sam? So just to try and understand these commitment conversations, I’ve heard you talk about the importance of clarity, the importance of communicating the expectation, measuring performance, showing respect while you’re doing all of that, right. How is that different to what most people would call a performance appraisal, or what we traditionally

Speaker 1  26:55

see in organizations, good, good. The goals we’re setting your goals right what you

Catherine McDonald  27:01

have to deliver on, and I’m going to give you feedback. So how is what you’re talking about different? Okay,

Sam Yankelevitch  27:06

so the process might be similar. Performance appraisals happen periodically. Once you know, like they’re periodic, I’m talking about a continuous coaching conversation with people to to keep the momentum going in a plant. I’ll give you some examples of how you know how I how I’ve used and how it’s different. So the performance appraisal will happen based on a period of time, over three months, sometimes six months. There’s companies that do these online. There’s companies that do these once a year, it’s too late. I like the I like commitment, conversation, models that plan, do, check, act cycles that happen very quickly, where you can actually build trust and delegate continuously, so you can start building, building the skill sets, the competencies, and you’re building organizational capacity, because you’re, you know, you’re able to delegate and then as a leader, and not only are you letting the folks shine, but you are then making yourself available to take on strategic your strategic tasks, because you’re Opening up time for yourself. But the, you know, the the beauty of this commitment conversation thing is that it’s ongoing. I had several opportunities, both when I was in my last employ. I left my last employment in 2013 which is like 12 years ago, and I went out into the world to do training and consulting and and stuff like that. And it’s amazing how this skill is so needed, you know, it’s a coaching skill to actually build capacity, so that people learn how to do problem solving, so that people are engaged, motivated, and, you know, and this is just, it’s just, uh, it’s, it’s so it’s, it’s daily, it’s, it’s daily. And I was able to do this in the German company where we were thrown a curveball by the customer, the main customer, which was like 85% of the business. This was an automotive company. They said, Well, we’re taking all you have to take all your business to Mexico, because it’s, you know, because we need the year over year pricing reductions and cost reductions. But we’re going to throw you a bone here. You can all do all the aftermarket for for us, you know. And we went from 40 part numbers to 1250 part numbers that were low volume, high mix, Harvard, high variety. And I had an incredible team of people. And so we went through this coaching. We went through the development of this how we how are they going to do it right? And by training them, developing skill sets using this model. Oh, gosh, that was so. Successful because they were successful because they were able to undertake, and I’m talking about about a group of about six employees that were just, they just jumped on this and this, this just went nuts. It was like, we called it flawless execution. We used standard work five SMED, you know, layered, layered process audits, all of the fun, lean stuff. And it was just churning, and this was in the US, so it was one of the examples, yeah, yeah. Can you,

Shayne Daughenbaugh  30:33

while we’re on kind of examples, you know, in, in doing this, and I love how, how you’re tying this in, and I’m kind of moving down the our list of questions. Catherine, just a little bit. Can you share an example where this, and I’m going to tie this back into the, you know, the topic again, is respectful delegation, like that’s what we’re talking about. Can you share an example where that has led to personal growth as well as, I mean, you kind of indicated that it also, you know, led to organizational growth or improved. You just, you just threw some numbers out there as well. So I see this tied through. But what I’m looking for is just something for our listeners, you know, to really be able to sink their teeth into, like, Hey. This, this idea of respectful delegation of, you know, these commitment conversations, these kind of things, they lead to personal growth as well as, you know, let’s not forget the people that are doing this work.

Sam Yankelevitch  31:30

Yes, that’s right, that Yeah. Thank you, Shane, that’s Yeah, and that’s actually very important for me. So, so, so another instance. So that one that I mentioned earlier, obviously, the people were just totally engaged, motivated. And I’ll just say the word meaningful work for them. It was meaningful work. They they wanted to come to work and that, you know, they just enjoyed same, very similar thing happened. I was abroad. I was in a, in a in a European company, as a interim manager for six months. And this was a very strange situation, because I found out that the by asking the managers so I was a general manager or acting general manager, I had six managers, and they pretty much told me. They said, our job, our job description is not about problem solving. We do not problem solve, which was the strangest environment that

Speaker 2  32:28

was, I don’t know what managers do then. Well, yeah, we’ll

Sam Yankelevitch  32:32

leave that for another podcast. But so I said, Well, we have this, these issues, you know, and I’m, I’m a GEMBA guy. I go to the game, I’m the guy that is on the shop floor continuously looking for opportunities, and I see everything on the boards, and I see the repeat issues, and I say, well, we got these repeat issues that are preventing the company from growing. Well, that’s, that’s not, that’s not our problem. So I went the next level, down as a coach, and I’m starting to coach people on, you know, through the commitment conversation model, but also coaching them on problem solving. It turns out these the team that was just below the that level. I’m talking about engineers, logistics personnel, HR, you know, a lot of operational folks. They all knew a three thinking they had, they either in the company or elsewhere. They had a three thinking they were just not asked to do this or maybe not allowed. And I said, Okay, well, let’s go. Let’s just take this one problem. What do you need from me? How can I help? And they said, Just stay away. They said, because I said, they said, Stay away. We got this, and they invited me to a meeting like the next day, and they said, Here’s the problem statement, here’s the, you know, here’s what we’re looking at. We’ve walked the floor. Here’s, you know, they went through the whole thing, and so, so the and they, I mean, they were just, they were thrilled to be able to jump in and solve problems. It was very, you know, the issues of satisfaction to them and and the other thing was, because this was a very hierarchical company, the approachability between myself as a general manager and the people below the level of managers for them was like, really, you know, really engaging. So I think that would that, you know, that led to both their personal growth and and as well, we they started churning out solutions to problems. And then, of course, in one fateful meeting, I asked, and then there were three managers that that started to jump on the bandwagon. You know, three out of the six, which wasn’t bad, but there were still some that just wouldn’t do it. And I made a snide comment, and I said, Well, kind of what you were saying, Shane, what do we need you for? So they didn’t like that. Of course, that was kind of insane. Maybe disrespectful, but maybe, maybe it was respect. Full in a challenge bring, you know, to talk about the elephant in the room, and, yeah, and bring it up, because, you know, respectful doesn’t mean politeness. Respectful means, you know, let’s bring the truth to the to the forefront here, and and work on the right things so,

Catherine McDonald  35:16

so on that then we are trying to strike a balance here, always, I guess we’re trying to be respectful to people. Always, we are trying to delegate, let’s say, authority, or give people the opportunity to take work on and be involved in everything, because that’s respectful. But we also have to be clear on our own standards and expectations. So you’re all the time trying to balance getting across what we need people to do, to align them to strategy and plans, but at the same time, give them enough space to make their own decisions and, you know, solve problems for themselves. So what in your experience? Sam, what can go wrong there? What’s the kind of mistakes that we make when we’re trying to get this balance right?

Sam Yankelevitch  36:03

Yeah. I mean, let me, let me see if I understand, if I understand the the question Catherine, I I think the, I think it has to be clear what the, what our role is as a task giver. If our role is a task giver is to be the boss. Then even, even if we use this framework, it’s going to sound mechanical technique, and it’s going to be intimidating, you know? And so I think the the role, I think it’s about the role that the person giving the task has to play. You know, that’s the it’s like, it’s this thing where, you know, the boss has the status, has the title, but usually the boss title and the status in a very hierarchical situation doesn’t explain what they do. Doesn’t explain the roles. And I think the roles are coach, problem solver, listener, integrator, colleague. You know, these things, these roles, have to be very clear up front. And once you understand your role as a leader, then that helps. I’ve, you know, I mean, I’ve seen so many Intimidators that are just after just to get the Yes, to get to do the gotcha. You said Yes, right? And and that I took that yes as a yes, you’re going to fulfill your commitment no matter what. And if you don’t, I’m going to nail you to the wall. And, you know, and that comes out, you know, I don’t know if that’s that’s kind of what you’re

Catherine McDonald  37:42

asking. Of what I’ve seen is that that sort of pressure that leaders sometimes put on people in those conversations, coaching conversations, it doesn’t always come from a bad place, either. Leaders are are good people, but they sometimes make mistakes. They sometimes are fearful for their own work. Maybe they’re fearful of somebody they’re reporting to, and that pressure gets on people they, you know, reporting to them. So I think what you said there is really key understanding your role as the leader in this position. My, my, yes, my job is to ensure that the work is done, but it’s not my my job to tell people what to do. So it’s about mindset going into those conversations shapes everything. So I think that’s a really good answer, Sam, for everybody listening. You know, in answer to that question of, how do we get that balance right? Well, you check yourself first, you check your mindset before you go into these conversations that shapes your behavior, your words, your language and all of that. So I think it’s an excellent answer, yeah.

Sam Yankelevitch  38:41

And let me, let me add to that Catherine, just as part of the framework the follow up question, which is that that and what’s next. The follow up question is part of is partially an answer to to prevent that from happening, by the way, because when you’re following up. So let’s say that, you know, if your task is only two days, there’s not much follow up. But what if your task is six weeks, right? Sure. So in the interim, many things can happen. So you, when you ask the follow up question, say, Okay, I want you to agree that we’re going to meet as part of our standard. We’re going to meet every Monday at 4pm I want to make sure that you’re going to be there. Okay, now the boss or the leader is CO accountable to make sure that that progress report happens. Now, I’ve had people I deal with, folks from everywhere in the world. There’s some cultures that don’t like to be micromanaged, or they say, I don’t need I don’t need you to babysit me. Sam, you know, if I give you my word, it’s my contract, I don’t need you to babysit me. Now, if you have good trust with them, maybe you let it go. But for the most part, my reply to that is, Listen, I have to report to my customer every week on. On Tuesday, so I need to know on Monday, I don’t want any surprises. I don’t want to be able I don’t want to have to lie to my customer. I want to know. That’s the reason why I need to meet with you and follow up. And guess what, many times the task givers are not following up, and they have to hold themselves accountable for not doing that, because at the end of the day, if you do have a surprise, then shame on both Right, right. Shame on both parties

Shayne Daughenbaugh  40:28

in what I’m hearing just the way, the way it’s working in my head, some of these words you’re saying are like connecting together. And I have written down here one of the things respectful delegation actually is equal to an invitation to be engaged and involved like, that’s, that’s really what you’re saying. You’re, you’re building that culture, Sam of or at least that’s what I’m hearing you’re saying, is you’re building that culture as as a leader that, yes, I’m going to respectfully delegate. We have all of these jobs, you know, you mentioned, here’s all these lists of things that have to be done or problems that have to be solved. I want to invite you, Catherine, into this. So of this, Hey, you know, let’s have this conversation. How are we calling it? The commitment conversation to to invite you into this, right? Is, is that? Is that kind of what? What I’m catching, because that that ties into kind of our last question as we wrap this up, you know, in how do we? How do we continue to create this culture where team members feel empowered to take ownership, even that they’re not waiting for you? Sam, to say, All right, you know, I showed up. I got my pencil now, give me something to write on. Well, you know, what am I? What am I doing? But, you know, feel you build this culture where you continue to invite into engagement and invite into the work that we’re doing, you know, where they feel empowered to take ownership and know that they’re supported and trusted. What are some things that you can list for, for you know, our listening audience, or, you know, those that are watching, you know, to kind of create this culture that, yeah, where they empowered and support and trusted. I’m

Sam Yankelevitch  42:02

going to share one more word with you, with the with the audience, and that word is strategy,

Shayne Daughenbaugh  42:08

strategy,

Sam Yankelevitch  42:11

okay? And what you’re talking about is, if we don’t, if we don’t do the commitment conversations is, I don’t know if this is coming out backward in the No, it’s, it’s perfect. So, so. But the you know, strategy is, is when you are not doing the commitment conversation model, and you’re not thinking of the other person, and you’re not there to develop, but just to be the boss and be intimidating, that’s a strategy, because what’s going to happen is that you’re setting the everything up for failure on both, you know, on both ends. So I promised I would share one more, one more tip from the framework of the type of question. I think this might be, this might be a gem for for the listeners, it has been for most of the folks. When I, when I do the training, it’s a scaling question, okay, and it comes from solutions focused coaching. And so I’m working through this, who’s going to do, what by when, what if, and what’s next? And then I’m going to ask Catherine, how comfortable on a scale from one to 10, where one is not very and 10 is very comfortable, how confident do you feel that you can actually fulfill the commitment? So Catherine is going to say Sam, maybe, maybe a six, right? Maybe a six. Oh, that’s very nice, very cool, Catherine. So why did you say six and not four? So the person’s going to answer why they said four. And guess what? You’re going to understand their strengths immediately. What it’s pointing is to their strengths, right, right, right. And then you build and you know what their strengths are and how, how you can delegate other things to them based on what they just replied, why they got to a six and not a four. Now you’re asking, as a leader and say, How can I get you to move from a six to a seven? And how can I help? That is a leadership coaching question that will really engage the other. And how can I help now, remember now or notice, I’m not saying, How can I get you from a six to a 10, which goes back to our Kaizen thinking that when you’re going small steps, you are engaging people because there’s less fear, there’s more psychological safety involved, because you have to take a small step, it’s not how can I go from six to a 10? Oh, well, that’s going to be difficult, right? And so that is a that’s an that is that opens up a space for tremendous dialog, conversation, really. It said it sets a very safe space for that other person to come up and say, hey. And by the way, I have this suggestion. I’m thinking that if we do this this and that you might not have to do it this way, we might be able to do it that way, so that, you know, so this, it’s a very engaged. Engaging thing. If the listeners have some kind of a lean daily management system already in in place, this is a tremendous coaching opportunity to use this framework, because lean daily management at the end of the day is daily accountability, meaningful work, engaging people for for continuous improvement, and using this is very powerful. It’s just, it’s just a very powerful framework. So I’m

Catherine McDonald  45:29

so glad you’ve Hi. We’re highlighting accountability today, because I do think accountability is sometimes the piece that’s missing in our coaching conversations. I think, you know, and I speak a lot about this with a friend of mine, but empathy is almost taken over. This word empathy, we have to, you know, listen to people, understand people, and we do, but we have to balance our empathy with accountability as leaders. So I think what you’ve given us today is a way to do that in a respectful way, because the job, the job has to be done. People have to be clear on what they need to do. It’s not all about, you know, simply listening, sitting back, giving people the floor it you have, you have to be able to do both for for business to work. So I think that’s been really, really, really helpful and useful. And thank you, Sam,

Sam Yankelevitch  46:16

yeah, I’m grateful that, yeah, that this, that this has been a good, you know, a good opportunity for the listeners to get something of value. I

Shayne Daughenbaugh  46:24

got it. I got a page worth of stuff, including including strategy and

Sam Yankelevitch  46:33

a quick plug. So I have so my courses on LinkedIn. There is one there. So there’s a course that is called improved communication using Lean thinking. And then there’s another one that is called Getting Things Done with commitment conversations, which explains the model really well. Yeah, it was, I think it’s two years old. So there’s some new stuff that I’ve that I’ve added in my trainings. I just did trainings for a large company in January in four different locations. So there’s some new things that come up, but it’s, it’s a lot about psychological safety, empathy, but getting the job done, which is what Catherine mentioned you you know, we’re still lean. It’s still about getting it done, getting the right things done in the right way. So

Catherine McDonald  47:13

and everybody’s happier when we get work done. Everybody’s happier. So it’s still a shared goal. So it’s all about how we how we go about it. So Sam and you’re on LinkedIn. You mentioned earlier on your books. Are they on Amazon?

Sam Yankelevitch  47:27

They’re on Amazon. Yeah, they’re on Amazon. My, yeah. My latest book is an interview with failure, which is my first fiction book. I saw this. It’s just an interesting study. I enter anthropoformised, anthropomorphic anthropomorphized failure as a person or as a character, and interviewed it, and it had a lot of things to say about failure. And of course, I use a lot of the Lean thinking on this stuff, but it takes away the fear of failure, you know. So it was just a very cool, a very cool book tour to work through, yeah. So it was Yeah. Well done.

Catherine McDonald  48:06

Well, this went so fast. Jane, didn’t I would love to.

Shayne Daughenbaugh  48:10

I was writing feverishly, trying to stay, trying to stay listening and what I’m glad. I’m glad, yeah, it has flown by. Sam, thank you so much for watching. Thank

Sam Yankelevitch  48:19

you all very much for the for the invitation, for allowing me to share

Catherine McDonald  48:26

so Shane, we have to wrap up.

Shayne Daughenbaugh  48:28

Okay, then I’ll let you do it. Wrap up.

Catherine McDonald  48:31

Okay, listen. Thank you, Sam. Thank you, Shane, as always. Lovely to see you as well, and we will say goodbye to our listeners, and don’t forget to check in next time on the Lean solutions podcast, bye for now, bye for now, bye.

Sam Yankelevitch  48:43

Thank you.